Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Martin Graesslin]

On Monday, July 11, 2016 9:55:20 PM CEST Nicolas Lécureuil wrote:
> This is really a good news.
> thank you.
> 
> Maybe a nonsense question, but is there a KF5 release planned as LTS to
> go with plasma 5.8 ?

not at all a nonsense question. It's something we have to discuss with the 
frameworks developers.

Cheers
Martin

signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Nicolas Lécureuil]

Le 2016-07-11 11:41, Martin Graesslin a écrit :

On Monday, June 27, 2016 2:28:42 PM CEST Martin Graesslin wrote:

Hi distributions,

in Plasma we are considering to add a long term support release. For 
this
idea we want to get some feedback from your side to know how we should 
set

this up.


In case you missed the news: at last week's Plasma IRC planning for 5.8 
we
decided to make Plasma/X11 5.8 an LTS release with at least 18 months 
of
support (if there is need for it, we might extend it). We will continue 
with
the Fibonacci styled release. Though also there we can be flexible and 
add

intermediate releases if needed.

Thanks for your feedback!


Hi,

This is really a good news.
thank you.

Maybe a nonsense question, but is there a KF5 release planned as LTS to 
go with plasma 5.8 ?

--
Regards,
Nicolas Lécureuil
Mageia KDE Team
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Matthias Klumpp]

Hey :)

Just a quick notice: All the judgement on this issue given by Debian
and Kubuntu people apply to Tanglu as well (and we completely agree
with Martin Steigerwalds post).

Cheers and greetings from Debconf!
Matthias
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Martin Graesslin]

On Wednesday, June 29, 2016 8:35:26 PM CEST Bernhard Rosenkraenzer wrote:
> On 2016-06-27 14:28, Martin Graesslin wrote:
> > Hi distributions,
> > 
> > in Plasma we are considering to add a long term support release. For
> > this idea
> > we want to get some feedback from your side to know how we should set
> > this up.
> 
>  From an OpenMandriva perspective:
> > We would like to know from you:
> > * is that something which is useful to you?
> 
> We're not too interested in another 5.7.x release when 5.8 is out,
> usually another .x doesn't break things too badly.
> 
> However:
> > * how often should we do an LTS release?
> 
> For us it would be useful to make an end-of-line release LTS. 5.(last
> before 6 is released), then 6.(last before 7) etc. being LTS would help
> us with people who are scared of more significant UI changes. We still
> have a few people who long for the "good old days" of KDE 3.x.
> We probably won't treat LTS releases that aren't end-of-line differently
> from "normal" releases.

That's something completely different to what we had in mind and I don't think 
that's possible. E.g. currently with 5.x we had 4.11 a long term support 
release for quite some time. But right now it's no longer supported and cannot 
be supported because Qt 4 is already EOL. Even if users want it, I think it's 
a disservice for all users to provide them unmaintained software. If Qt 
doesn't provide support any more, we cannot provide support for software 
depending on it either.

I don't expect that this will be different once Qt 6 comes out. So I don't 
expect it to be possible to provide support for Plasma 5 for the life time of 
Plasma 6.

Not to mention of all the problems which start to exist once you upgrade the 
system without touching everything. Recently I was contacted by an NVIDIA dev 
about a problem their latest beta driver exposes in KWin 4.11. A problem which 
would require a large restructuring of the source code which exists in the 5.x 
branch. It's something you don't want in a LTS release. But it shows the big 
problem: you cannot move the stack underneath without touching everything. 
Things like adjustments to newer systemd (hello things moving around from udev 
to somewhere else), adjustments to newer compilers (hello gcc6), adjustments 
for obscure things like XServer no longer running as root (caused problems in 
Qt 4). These are all examples for showing that you cannot just hibernate part 
of the stack.

Cheers
Martin

signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Philip Muskovac]

Hi,

Am 27.06.2016 um 14:28 schrieb Martin Graesslin:

Hi distributions,

in Plasma we are considering to add a long term support release. For this idea
we want to get some feedback from your side to know how we should set this up.

Here is an example (I mean it!) for how this could look like:
* 5.8 first LTS release based on Qt 5.6 (which is also an LTS) for X11
* every fourth release will be another LTS release, so with the 3 month cycle
there is one LTS per year - 5.8, 5.12, 5.16
* Support is for five release cycles, so with 5.13 the 5.8 LTS goes EOL, with
5.17 the 5.12 release goes EOL
* bug fix release continue in the Fibonacci schedule till the EOL release

We would like to know from you:
* is that something which is useful to you?
So after initially being a bit surprised, I would probably appreciate 
this. Now let me put my Kubuntu hat on.


Kubuntu is on a 6 month release schedule with an LTS every 2 years in 
April. Our current LTS release ships Plasma 5.5 (because 5.6 was far 
late in our cycle to get done), and we're still backporting fixes in 
various places for it. Being able to ship an LTS with a Plasma release 
that receives upstream support until the .1 LTS update 3 months after 
release would be awesome for us and our users.

* how often should we do an LTS release?
as I said, we're on a 2 year schedule, so that's all we really need. As 
other distributions are shifted, one per year sounds reasonable IMO.

* how often should we do bug fix releases for an LTS?
I think the fibonacci updates haven been doing their job just fine? That 
would give ~8 updates over a year. As 13 and 21 weeks are a bit far 
apart between the last 2 releases, maybe switch to a 2 month schedule 
after .6? That would give 11 updates in total I think?. (I don't think 
more updates make sense, and you also need to find developers that are 
willing to fix something in the pre-pre-pre-current release)

* how long should a LTS be supported?
I would be happy with your proposal, but it would be nice if security 
issues could be evaluated for the previous LTS as well. Doesn't need a 
release, a note in the advisory would be sufficient.


Related to that:
* what to do with frameworks?
* Would you freeze the frameworks version or continue to backport newer
framework versions to your distribution?
* Would you want an LTS branch for frameworks as well?
* What would you expect that to look like?
For frameworks I'm clueless, really. To be able to use a frameworks 
release in Kubuntu as an "update" it would have to...
- not cause any regressions [Not in plasma, not in any other software 
that uses it] (Hi behavior change when closing applications)
- not have any new or updated dependencies ("new" as in: we would need 
to add/update a 3rd party package)
- not have any component or pieces of a component removed (counts as 
"regression" [not frameworks, but hi kdepim for once removing unused 
public libs in a "bugfix" update])
- not have any components added (ok, that could probably be handled if 
really necessary)


That's why we and other distributions were asking for bugfix releases 
for frameworks 2 years ago. Did something change in the meantime that I 
missed?


Looking forward to your input on this rather important topic.

Cheers
Martin


Here you have it and thanks for the idea ;)

Philip
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Bernhard Rosenkraenzer]

On 2016-06-27 14:28, Martin Graesslin wrote:

Hi distributions,

in Plasma we are considering to add a long term support release. For 
this idea
we want to get some feedback from your side to know how we should set 
this up.


From an OpenMandriva perspective:


We would like to know from you:
* is that something which is useful to you?


We're not too interested in another 5.7.x release when 5.8 is out, 
usually another .x doesn't break things too badly.

However:


* how often should we do an LTS release?


For us it would be useful to make an end-of-line release LTS. 5.(last 
before 6 is released), then 6.(last before 7) etc. being LTS would help 
us with people who are scared of more significant UI changes. We still 
have a few people who long for the "good old days" of KDE 3.x.
We probably won't treat LTS releases that aren't end-of-line differently 
from "normal" releases.



* how often should we do bug fix releases for an LTS?


Distros on fixed release schedules will disagree, but I think there's 
not much of a point in scheduling bug fix releases - I'd opt for 
"release when an important bug is fixed".



* how long should a LTS be supported?


If following the end-of-line idea, ideally until the next big release is 
out (so support 4.x until 6.0 is stable, 5.x until 7.0 is stable, ...)



Related to that:
* what to do with frameworks?
* Would you freeze the frameworks version or continue to backport newer
framework versions to your distribution?
* Would you want an LTS branch for frameworks as well?
* What would you expect that to look like?


I think as far as we're concerned, that's done anyway - there will 
probably be a 5.x branch when switching to Qt6 at some point.


ttyl
bero
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Gastón Cocco]

Good idea.

El mié., 29 de jun. de 2016 11:29 AM, Martin Gräßlin 
escribió:

> Am 2016-06-29 15:34, schrieb Philip Muskovac:
> >> * how long should a LTS be supported?
> > I would be happy with your proposal, but it would be nice if security
> > issues could be evaluated for the previous LTS as well. Doesn't need a
> > release, a note in the advisory would be sufficient.
>
> Just as a note: we hit one sever security issue in 5.x so far and that
> got backported to all releases (including 5.0). So yeah that certainly
> sounds doable and is also something I expect our security team to ask
> for.
>
> >>
> >> Related to that:
> >> * what to do with frameworks?
> >> * Would you freeze the frameworks version or continue to backport
> >> newer
> >> framework versions to your distribution?
> >> * Would you want an LTS branch for frameworks as well?
> >> * What would you expect that to look like?
> > For frameworks I'm clueless, really. To be able to use a frameworks
> > release in Kubuntu as an "update" it would have to...
> > - not cause any regressions [Not in plasma, not in any other software
> > that uses it] (Hi behavior change when closing applications)
> > - not have any new or updated dependencies ("new" as in: we would need
> > to add/update a 3rd party package)
> > - not have any component or pieces of a component removed (counts as
> > "regression" [not frameworks, but hi kdepim for once removing unused
> > public libs in a "bugfix" update])
> > - not have any components added (ok, that could probably be handled if
> > really necessary)
> >
> > That's why we and other distributions were asking for bugfix releases
> > for frameworks 2 years ago. Did something change in the meantime that
> > I missed?
>
> I'm not aware of any changes.
>
> >>
> >> Looking forward to your input on this rather important topic.
> >>
> >> Cheers
> >> Martin
> >
> > Here you have it and thanks for the idea ;)
>
> Thanks for the feedback, very appreciated.
>
> Cheers
> Martin
> ___
> Plasma-devel mailing list
> Plasma-devel@kde.org
> https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel
>
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Re: Long term support release for Plasma?

[Martin Gräßlin]

Am 2016-06-29 15:34, schrieb Philip Muskovac:

* how long should a LTS be supported?

I would be happy with your proposal, but it would be nice if security
issues could be evaluated for the previous LTS as well. Doesn't need a
release, a note in the advisory would be sufficient.


Just as a note: we hit one sever security issue in 5.x so far and that 
got backported to all releases (including 5.0). So yeah that certainly 
sounds doable and is also something I expect our security team to ask 
for.




Related to that:
* what to do with frameworks?
* Would you freeze the frameworks version or continue to backport 
newer

framework versions to your distribution?
* Would you want an LTS branch for frameworks as well?
* What would you expect that to look like?

For frameworks I'm clueless, really. To be able to use a frameworks
release in Kubuntu as an "update" it would have to...
- not cause any regressions [Not in plasma, not in any other software
that uses it] (Hi behavior change when closing applications)
- not have any new or updated dependencies ("new" as in: we would need
to add/update a 3rd party package)
- not have any component or pieces of a component removed (counts as
"regression" [not frameworks, but hi kdepim for once removing unused
public libs in a "bugfix" update])
- not have any components added (ok, that could probably be handled if
really necessary)

That's why we and other distributions were asking for bugfix releases
for frameworks 2 years ago. Did something change in the meantime that
I missed?


I'm not aware of any changes.



Looking forward to your input on this rather important topic.

Cheers
Martin


Here you have it and thanks for the idea ;)


Thanks for the feedback, very appreciated.

Cheers
Martin
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel

Long term support release for Plasma?

[Martin Graesslin]

Hi distributions,

in Plasma we are considering to add a long term support release. For this idea 
we want to get some feedback from your side to know how we should set this up.

Here is an example (I mean it!) for how this could look like:
* 5.8 first LTS release based on Qt 5.6 (which is also an LTS) for X11
* every fourth release will be another LTS release, so with the 3 month cycle 
there is one LTS per year - 5.8, 5.12, 5.16
* Support is for five release cycles, so with 5.13 the 5.8 LTS goes EOL, with 
5.17 the 5.12 release goes EOL
* bug fix release continue in the Fibonacci schedule till the EOL release

We would like to know from you:
* is that something which is useful to you?
* how often should we do an LTS release?
* how often should we do bug fix releases for an LTS?
* how long should a LTS be supported?

Related to that: 
* what to do with frameworks?
* Would you freeze the frameworks version or continue to backport newer 
framework versions to your distribution?
* Would you want an LTS branch for frameworks as well?
* What would you expect that to look like?

Looking forward to your input on this rather important topic.

Cheers
Martin

signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
___
Plasma-devel mailing list
Plasma-devel@kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/plasma-devel