Re: [gentoo-kernel] vanilla-kernel sources should not be marked stable for obsolete versions

[Mike Pagano]

On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 09:27:10AM -0700, Greg KH wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 22, 2013 at 08:45:25AM +0200, Tom Wijsman wrote:
> > On Fri, 21 Jun 2013 20:42:44 -0700
> > Greg KH <greg@×××××.com> wrote:
> >
> > > On Sat, Jun 22, 2013 at 02:45:16AM +0200, Tom Wijsman wrote:
> > > > On Fri, 21 Jun 2013 17:13:03 -0700
> > > > Greg KH <gregkh@g.o> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Great!  But as only the latest version released is "stable",
> > > > > that's all that should stick around, right?
> > > >
> > > > Tricky decision to make. Do we really want to force people's kernel
> > > > sources to unmerge every single time you push a new version? Which
> > > > on its own turn, forces them to build and install the new kernel.
> > >
> > > If they are following the vanilla kernels, isn't that what people
> > > expect?  The latest stable-kernel-of-the-week, as that's what I'm
> > > releasing.  They don't have to do an update if they don't want to :)
> >
> > If we don't keep around other ebuilds their sources will unexpectedly
> > unmerge upon a dependency clean; they can only stop it if they see it
> > in the list of packages that will be unmerged, and do something to
> > specifically keep them.
>
> True, so we can keep around 3-4 older ebuilds if needed, per kernel
> release.  But who really does a dependency clean these days, I've never
> done one :)
>
> So, what's the next step?  Should I announce the change to -dev?  Anyone
> else really object to it?  Other thoughts?
>
> thanks,
>
> greg k-h
>

Are we agreed on a few facts?

1. Upstream release rate is now a much higher 1-2 kernels a week.
2. Very frequently, these releases contain security fixes.
3. This rate of release puts arch teams in a difficult position, since
it is unsustainable to try to keep up tp date with stabilization
4. By continuing the policy of providing a stable kernel version, Gentoo
is giving a false sense of security to its users, since by the time the
kernel does get stabilized, a newer version more with more security
fixes is almost always already released.

Auto stabling keywords again will give that false impression of Gentoo
QA on a particular arch, so I don't think I would want that.

A downside is that a kernel could be released that wont build on an
arch. Does that imply failure of our QA process? Or is it acceptable, as
a fix almost always follows right after that kind of situation.







-- 
Mike Pagano
Gentoo Developer - Kernel Project
Gentoo Sources - Lead 
E-Mail     : mpagano@g.o
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