Bugs Delay Release of Debian Lenny

A. B. VerHausen writes to tell us that over 200 release-critical bugs continue to push back Debian Lenny's release date. Originally slated for a September release, there is still a long road to be traveled before Lenny sees the light of day. Project leader Steve McIntyre says they may consider dropping some packages for the release if they continue to cause problems, and while an end of October release is the goal, only time will tell.

Comments

Good!

[bjourne]

This is good news. There are many distributions that just take the latest and greatest of every package without doing proper quality control (Ubuntu, Gentoo, Fedora, etc). The price they pay is regressions and stuff that doesn't work. There needs to be distros like Debian which, while always delayed, has all the important bugs ironed out.

Re:Good!

[Meshach]

Obviously you have never worked in software QA. There are always bugs that make it into released project. The art of good project management is deciding which bugs can be allowed into the final project (ie which will actually impact users).

Also I am pretty sure that Ubuntu is based on Debian.

Re:Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

Obviously you suck at reading comprehension.

There needs to be distros like Debian which, while always delayed, has all the important bugs ironed out.

Re:Good!

[WK2]

There needs to be distros like Debian which, while always delayed, has all the important bugs ironed out.

Debian is like Debian. Seriously, how many Debian distros do we really need? 1 is fine with me.

Also I am pretty sure that Ubuntu is based on Debian.

Ubuntu is based on Debian Unstable. Their release processes are entirely different. Ubuntu includes buggy packages that Debian would reject in a stable release.

Re:Good!

[morgan_greywolf]

If you think Ubuntu has the latest and greatest packages, maybe you should try it once. Most of the packages are outdated and I don't rely on the package manager if I want the latest version anymore.

To be fair, Debian does do quite a bit more testing than Ubuntu. OTOH, Ubuntu does a lot more spit-and-polish integration than Debian and is unafraid to take controversial stances on things like binary drivers or distributing Firefox with Firefox branding (as opposed to Ice Weasel or whatever) or distributing some codecs that may be violating patents or using code from other distros (like system-config-printer).

Debian is more about stability and reliability, while Ubuntu is more about the end-user experience.

When you make a Linux distro, you have to make a few tradeoffs. The differences between Ubuntu and Debian are mostly about differences in decision-making regarding these tradeoffs.

Release When Ready

[mpapet]

For production quality operating systems there is *nothing* better than release when ready. Given the sheer number of packages and diversity of platforms, all the Debian volunteers do a great job.

It remains the corner-case user who needs the latest and greatest release of any given package.

As an fyi, I've been running Lenny for at least 6 months as a clean-install desktop with no issues. Upgrading from stable to Lenny had issues for me. I've got two servers running Lenny without show-stopper bugs right now.

Lenny's got a really nice KDE4 in an unofficial repo at deb http://kde4.debian.net/ . I encourage users to check it out. Don't enter bugs against these packages in Debian though.

Re:Please, we want Debian 4.1, not 5.0

[Slashdot Parent]

What I would like to have is a 4.1 release

Well, don't project what you want unto the rest of the world.

Debian stable is a server distro. Every time there is an upgrade, a full regression test must be done to the server. This is expensive and time-consuming. The whole idea of Debian stable is that it is stable and doesn't change often. No one running stable wants the latest and greatest. We want stability and security fixes. That's it.

Clearly you already know about the testing and unstable releases, but did you know about backports and volitile? Volitile is great for things like anti-virus and anti-spam software that you really do want and need upgrades. Backports is a little different--it's basically upgrades for popular packages in stable, and you can pick and choose which ones you want.

Stable means stable, and backports and volitile are great tools to help you. If you want the latest and greatest, that's what the testing release is for.

Don't use Sarge

[swillden]

I still use Debian Sarge on my current server.

Bad idea. Support for Sarge ended in April, so you haven't been getting any security updates since then, and there are some known weaknesses.

You should upgrade to Etch, ASAP.

Re:Don't use Sarge

[ignavus]

I still use Debian Sarge on my current server.

Bad idea. Support for Sarge ended in April, so you haven't been getting any security updates since then, and there are some known weaknesses.

You should upgrade to Etch, ASAP.

Look, just get his IP address and do it for him.

Re:Debian has no release date!!!

[RAMMS EIN]

While I don't dispute the claims you make, I would like to point out that

1. Debian does make announcements about prospective release dates. These aren't firm promises and shouldn't be interpreted as such, but it is disappointing when they miss those dates by months.

2. Releases aren't only made when the bug count drops to zero. First of all, there are bugs that aren't considered "release-critical". Secondly, sometimes (I think this happened with etch) releases are made with known issues and a promise to fix those issues Real Soon Now. Thirdly, the way the bug count is brought to zero usually includes simply throwing out packages that have known bugs. If many people want such a package, that isn't very helpful.

3. Bugs that would have been "release-critical" are often discovered after a release is made. The current stable release, etch, had more release-critical bugs pending against it than lenny (the upcoming stable release), last time I checked.

What all this means is that Debian will _not_ generalyl be released at any date that has been mentioned, and will _not_ generally be bug-free when released.

Having said all that, it's still my favorite operating system, as it takes less of my time to use and maintain than anything else I have tried (and that is quite a lot).