Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1753104Ab0GLT6V (ORCPT ); Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:58:21 -0400 Received: from hawking.rebel.net.au ([203.20.69.83]:32905 "EHLO hawking.rebel.net.au" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1752554Ab0GLT6T (ORCPT ); Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:58:19 -0400 Message-ID: <4C3B73D7.8050802@davidnewall.com> Date: Tue, 13 Jul 2010 05:28:15 +0930 From: David Newall User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.23 (X11/20090817) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Stefan Richter CC: Marcin Letyns , Linux Kernel Mailing List Subject: Re: stable? quality assurance? References: <201007110918.42120.Martin@lichtvoll.de> <20100711131640.GA3503@thunk.org> <4C3ABA35.7020507@davidnewall.com> <4C3B3B39.2000809@davidnewall.com> <4C3B585A.6090106@s5r6.in-berlin.de> In-Reply-To: <4C3B585A.6090106@s5r6.in-berlin.de> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; 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: 1744 Lines: 39 Stefan Richter wrote: > David Newall wrote: > >> Thus 2.6.34 is the latest gamma-test kernel. It's not stable and I >> doubt anybody honestly thinks otherwise. >> > > It works stable for what I use it for. > Mea culpa. I didn't mean that 2.6.34 is unstable, but that the term "stable" is not appropriate for a newly released kernel; "gamma" should be used instead. Merely six months ago 2.6.32 was released; today we're preparing for 2.6.35; a new kernel every two months! Perhaps 2.6.31 is truly the latest stable kernel; or else 2.6.27 does, which is the other 2.6 on the front page of kernel.org. I'm pretty sure 2.4 is stable (which might explain why I see it embedded *much* more frequently than 2.6.) > If it doesn't for you, then I hope you are already in contact with the > respective subsystem developers to get the regressions that you > experience fixed. > (Segue to a problem which follows from calling bleeding-edge kernels "stable".) When reporting bugs, the first response is often, "we're not interested in such an old kernel; try it with the latest." That's not hugely useful when the latest kernels are not suitable for production use. If kernels weren't marked stable until they had earned the moniker, for example 2.6.27, then the expectation of developers and of users would be consistent: developers could expect users to try it again with latest stable kernel, and users could reasonably expect that trying it wouldn't break their system. -- 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/