5.0 newbies: FreeBSD's future [was: Re: Tracking -CURRENT]

Kris Kennaway wrote:
--------
On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 04:27:53PM +0200, CARTER Anthony wrote:
> I am tracking current, I would have presumed that this would be 
> sufficient to
> know what was going on...To be part of CVS-up as well would mean
probably 
> another 100-200 mails a night that I don't particularly use...

If you can't keep up with the mailing lists, then do us all a favour and
stick to -stable.
-------

CURRENT Regulars:

The FreeBSD release cycle is presently in a somewhat unusual situation
that I suspect may not have been taken into consideration when the
section in the Handbook stating that those running -current should read
both -current and -cvs* was established. The present status may be less
obvious to regular users and readers of -current as it is to those who
have begun running -current recently. Here is what is going on:

Early-adopters are trying 5.0-RELEASE. It tends to soon become clear to
them that 5.0-RELEASE does not meet their expectations for stability.
Please understand that whether or not 5.0-RELEASE met the official
criteria for a release is largely irrelevant to this discussion. What
matters is that 5.0 users very rapidly run into a situation where they
need both help and bug fixes.

>From the perspective of a mere 5.0 user, which may be very different
from the perspective of a FreeBSD developer, running the HEAD is at the
moment the only way to get the bug fixes they need. The -current mailing
list is the one and only place where they can find help they not only
need, but very much deserve:

I fully agree that the 5.0 project needed vastly more testers to move
forward. I also understand that for those testers to be found 5.0 had to
be officially released. But now that the FreeBSD project has the testers
it has been seeking, many of which may not have fully realized the
extend of testing they would engage in due to 5.0's official RELEASE
status, I believe the most urgent thing to do at this time is to answer
these users' questions on the mailing list and to fix the bugs those
users discover.

These 5.0 early adopters, who may not be part of the usual community
reading -current, are right now between a rock and hard place. They
aren't FreeBSD developers, they had never intended to sign up for
running the HEAD, they signed up for -current after realizing that there
was no help to be had on -stable, and they can't reasonably be expected
to additionally start reading the cvs mailing lists.

The situation will improve once 5.x becomes more stable and 5.1 will be
released. Until then, please go easy on non-developers that post to
-current. They have nowhere else to go and they are critical to
FreeBSD's future since without them FreeBSD use will shrivel away as 4.x
becomes increasingly depreciated.

Thanks for listening,
--Lucky Green