FreeBSD has serious problems with focus, longevity, and lifecycle

[Matt Olander]

On Tue, Jan 17, 2012 at 1:27 PM, Mark Blackman <mark at exonetric.com> wrote:
> On 17 Jan 2012, at 21:09, Warner Losh wrote:
>
>>
>> On Jan 17, 2012, at 11:12 AM, John Kozubik wrote:
>>> Again, I'm not suggesting more snapshots - I am suggesting more real, bona fide releases.  This will help people.
>>
>> I tend to agree with you.  Our release engineering process isn't serving the needs of users as much as it once did.  When Walnut Creek was running release engineering, we had releases often because they wanted to make money from their subscriptions.  This produced reasonably spaced minor releases and except for 4-5, decently spaced major releases.  Even after the torch passed from walnut creek to others, there was still either residual pressures to make the releases happen, or inherited mindset that keep on the same pace.
>>
>> Today we have lost our way.  We have no major vendor pushing the process along to make it happen faster.
>
> What exactly did the major vendor to push things along? Keep nagging?
>
> I'd have thought PC-BSD and iXsystems are the natural people to to take over that role in any
> case.   The FreeBSD foundation seems  less interested in the "for end-users" angle as well.

We'd be happy to sponsor a full-time employee at the Mall to handle
rolling -STABLE into release a few more times per year. We might need
a bit of help maintaining a long term release but we think it's a
pretty good idea all the way around.

Cheers,
-matt