Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1756280Ab0GLP4q (ORCPT ); Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:56:46 -0400 Received: from hawking.rebel.net.au ([203.20.69.83]:56215 "EHLO hawking.rebel.net.au" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1752572Ab0GLP4p (ORCPT ); Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:56:45 -0400 Message-ID: <4C3B3B39.2000809@davidnewall.com> Date: Tue, 13 Jul 2010 01:26:41 +0930 From: David Newall User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.23 (X11/20090817) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Marcin Letyns CC: Linux Kernel Mailing List Subject: Re: stable? quality assurance? References: <201007110918.42120.Martin@lichtvoll.de> <20100711131640.GA3503@thunk.org> <4C3ABA35.7020507@davidnewall.com> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=KOI8-R; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 2446 Lines: 48 Marcin, >> I don't expect fair consideration of these comments; why change when >> shooting the messenger is so much more satisfying? >> Q.E.D. First, for the sake of brevity, I want it agreed that we're talking about new kernels, not those which are old, time-tested and patched. I didn't notice anyone say they want Linux development to slow down; rather, and not just in this thread but in many threads before, that kernels released as "stable" fail to meet the common meaning of that word; and this needs to be improved. Predictably, the common response sounds a bit like "shut up, go away, you're an idiot, it doesn't happen to me." These are not useful as they serve not one whit to improve the situation, but give pause to those who might otherwise want to bring up a valid issue, once more. Expectations are key to the problem. When Linus says, "here is a shiny new, stable kernel", he creates expectations. When that kernel proves unstable, those expectations are dashed and confidence in Linux suffers. There's no reason why development methods need to change in order to reduce the number of flaky "stable" kernels. It would be sufficient to replace the somewhat deceptive word "stable" with one that is more accurate; beta or gamma test make sense as they already have industry acceptance. Clearly "stable" is not appropriate, as implicitly agreed by others who have advised: "don't use in production"; "wait at least a year"; and more. Thus 2.6.34 is the latest gamma-test kernel. It's not stable and I doubt anybody honestly thinks otherwise. As to whether other operating systems are stable, well that's a fair question. I agree that few large bodies of computer code are flawless, and so stability can be relative. In that spirit I venture to put the stipulated kernels into order of decreasing reliability: Best is BSD, Solaris & OS X; then Windows; and then there's Linux. If named distributions had been included, the list would look better (for us); they'd go in the first group. Thank goodness for the Debian, Red Hat and Novell (to name just a few) for giving the world something which does, at least largely, meet expectations. -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/