Re: Change to FreeBSD release scheduling etc.

On 7/15/24 14:33, Tomoaki AOKI wrote:
> On Mon, 15 Jul 2024 11:58:16 -0700
> Colin Percival <cperciva@freebsd.org> wrote:
>> Extending the minor-release support period might be possible, but that
>> would depend on portmgr and secteam and I can't speak for them.  One issue
>> which would certainly come up is kernel module packages -- our packages
>> are built for each stable branch on the oldest currently supported release,
>> which means that e.g. new features in 14.1 can't be used until 14.0 is EoL;
>> this is a problem particularly for graphics drivers.
> 
> How do you think about flavorizing kmod ports in kmod.mk and provide
> pkgs for latest patch release (like 14.0-p8) of all supported
> point releases (like 14.0) [1]?
> Does it look possible and feasible?

Rebuilding kernel modules for each patch level shouldn't be necessary.  If
we break KBI in a security or errata update, something has gone astonishingly
wrong.

Flavouring kernel module ports for each minor release -- possibly building in
in an oldest-supported-release jail but with the relevant /usr/src/sys tree --
might work well?  But that's a question for portmgr; I don't know enough about
how package building works to know how feasible this would be.

-- 
Colin Percival
FreeBSD Release Engineering Lead & EC2 platform maintainer
Founder, Tarsnap | www.tarsnap.com | Online backups for the truly paranoid