Tom Lane wrote:
Andrew Dunstan <and...@dunslane.net> writes:
I think we can avoid most of these problems by making a "best effort"
policy rather than a hard promise. But it can be moderately specific
about what we will make best efforts towards. I agree that anyone who
wants a hard promise should be getting commercial support.
I don't mind the idea of saying "our intention is to support new
releases for about five years", or something equally squishy.
But a list of dates in black and white does not look reasonable,
especially not dates that are four or five years out for versions
that have zero track record. We have no idea whatsoever what the
future will bring.
Would it be reasonable to have the "squishy intention" coupled with a
more firm policy of "...EOL will be announced X months in
advance...Users requiring firm long-term EOL commitments are advised to
purchase commercial support..."
Perhaps the postgresql.org home-page should be modified slightly.
Instead of "Latest Releases" (which doesn't even list 7.4 when I just
looked), it could be something like "Current Releases". Then when EOL is
announced, the release could be suffixed with the EOL date (i.e. 7.4.25
EOL 2009-12-31 - maybe even with the EOL date in bold and/or red) which
would link to the EOL announcement or general EOL statement page.
I think that a "EOL Statement" link to a page with the generic statement
placed just below the oldest release could be helpful as well.
Cheers,
Steve