Release update: editorial changes to the testing propagation scripts To: [email protected] Subject: Release update: editorial changes to the testing propagation scripts From: Steve Langasek <[email protected]> Date: Tue, 3 May 2005 12:46:32 -0700 Mail-followup-to: [email protected] Message-id: <[email protected]> Old-return-path: <[email protected]> User-agent: Mutt/1.5.6+20040907i Hello world, Anthony Towns has committed a minor change to the britney script which manages updates of packages to testing, and as a result packages are no longer being accepted into testing without hand-approval by a member of the release team. Wait, that didn't come out quite right. Let's try again. Sarge is now frozen! Wheeeeeee!!! Thanks are due to everyone who has helped get us to this point: in particular our ftpmasters, Anthony Towns, James Troup, and Ryan Murray, for their continued dedication which has made it possible for mortals to wrangle behemoths such as the 9,000-package sarge; our co-wranglers, the release assistants Andreas Barth, Frank Lichtenheld, and Joey Hess; and you, gentle maintainer, for your support and patience. For those maintainers whose packages were unprepared for a freeze at this moment (the process has, after all, been a long one), you still have one last opportunity to get things into shape if there are any remaining important problems. Read on. Now to explain what, exactly, we mean by "freeze". The base freeze upload policy of uploading changes in through unstable if you can, and testing-proposed-updates if you must, has worked well (or so is the subjective opinion of the release team), so we plan to continue to apply the same policy for the freeze of the rest of the archive. This means that, for all packages that still need to be updated for sarge, the rules are as follows: - If your package needs to be updated for sarge, and the version in unstable doesn't contain extraneous changes (e.g, the version is the same between testing and unstable), please upload your fix to unstable and contact [email protected]. - If the version in unstable already includes significant changes not related to the bug to be fixed, contact debian-release about uploading to testing-proposed-updates. Changed dependencies, new upstream versions, changed library names, and completely rewriting the packaging are "significant changes". So are lots of other things. - If the version in unstable won't reach testing because of new library dependencies, contact debian-release about uploading to testing-proposed-updates. - If in doubt, contact debian-release first. - In all cases, when preparing an upload please do not make changes to the package that are not related to fixing the bugs in question. Doing so makes it more time consuming for the release team to review and approve such requests, delaying the release. It also delays the fix for your package, because you will be asked to reupload. - When contacting the release team, please explain why you are requesting an update. Bug numbers are a must. The more we can figure out from your first email and your changelog (if any), the more quickly we can get your update in. - If you have a package that needs updating, *please* don't forget to contact us. *Don't expect us to find out about it on our own*. Putting a comment in the changelog is not contacting the release team. :) (This has happened at least a couple of times during the base freeze; it's not a very good way of getting your package approved quickly.) Now, so as not to have everyone contact us at once about packages we know we won't approve, here are the guidelines for changes that will be accepted into testing during the freeze: - fixes for release critical bugs (i.e., bugs of severity critical, grave, and serious) in all packages - fixes for severity: important bugs in packages of priority: optional or extra, only when this can be done via unstable - translation updates - documentation fixes See <http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2004/08/msg00001.html> for comparison. As always, it is the release team's goal to get as much good software into sarge as possible. However, a freeze does not mean that your package is ensured a spot in the release. Please continue to stay on top of release-critical bugs in packages that you maintain; RC bugs in optional or extra packages that remain unfixed after a week will still be grounds for removal from testing, just as they have been up to this point. Please also note that since many updates (hopefully, the vast majority) will still be going in through unstable, major changes in unstable right now can disrupt efforts to get RC bugs fixed. We don't ask you not to make changes in unstable, but we do ask that you be aware of the effects your changes can have -- especially if you maintain a library -- and to feel free to continue making use of experimental where appropriate. Note once again that you can stage NEW uploads in experimental to avoid disruption in unstable. Timeline -------- Now, let's resurrect that earlier freeze timeline, and make a few changes to it based on the great improvements in sarge since we last looked at the question: 3 May 2005 ~85 RC bugs testing-proposed-updates, testing-security working for all architectures Official security support for sarge begins Freeze time! Joey Schulze of the security team has given the thumbs-up for official security support for sarge as of the time of the freeze. Which is now. With security support in place, adventurous users can begin testing the upgrade path from woody to sarge. Their feedback will be used for further bugfixing of packages, and to start preparing release notes. Currently, this is tempered by known bug #278495, which affects perl when upgrading on a sizable percentage of systems. We hope this bug will be addressed soon, so that we can start getting good upgrade reports in ASAP. 5-8 May 2005 ~70-60 RC bugs Bug Squashing Party Frank Lichtenheld has, with prescient and uncanny timing, announced a BSP for this coming weekend[1]. Now that we have a relatively fixed number of release-critical bugs in sarge, we hope to quickly eliminate the remaining RC bugs. We need your help to do that, though, so volunteers for squashing bugs and processing upgrade reports is appreciated. If you are interested in helping to process upgrade reports, please subscribe to [email protected] and contact debian-release. 18 May 2005 ~15 RC bugs d-i final if needed As before, being able to hold to this schedule depends heavily on a steadily dropping RC bug count, so if that isn't happening, the timeline will have to be tweaked accordingly. Security bugs will, however, not figure into this count for the most part because they can and will be fixed post-release. Experience shows that d-i releases take a bit longer to roll out than this timeline is really allowing for, so the plan is to release sarge with d-i RC3. However, there has been some discussion of less intrusive per-arch uploads of the installer, to take care of some specific kernel bugs; if this happens, it would be around this date. 27 May 2005 0 RC bugs Any remaining release-critical bugs will be fixed through uploads to testing-proposed-updates or by removals from sarge. With a final cut of the installer in the bag and the effective RC count down to zero, it's time to finalize the installation manual and release notes and to create official CD images. 30 May 2005 Release And if everything goes well, we'll be ready to release at the end of the month. We'll continue to post updates as the freeze goes on. For now, please concentrate on fixing the last few issues, and hey, let's see if we can stick to this schedule! Cheers, -- Steve Langasek and Colin Watson Debian Release Managers http://release.debian.org/ [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2005/05/msg00000.html --

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