Update strategy

[Rahul Sundaram]

Thorsten Leemhuis wrote:

> So my answer for this specific app would be: if there are minor TestDisk
> versions (e.g. from 6.6-1.fc7 to 6.6-2 or 6.7-2) that *mainly* fix bugs
> released over the next 2 or 3 years then feel free to update them in
> EPEL *if* there is a really good reason for it. Major new versions that
> that change behavior (e.g. command line options for example) should be
> avoid if possible. After RHEL6 is out and settled for a while only touch
> the RHEL5 TestDisk package if there is a strong need to and avoid even
> minor versions.
> 
> That round about what
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/EPEL/GuidelinesAndPolicies says afaics.
> 
> Other opinions?

Though there is no formal document yet afaik describing this process in 
RHEL "leaf applications" are treated different from base applications. 
Base applications are things like libraries which are other applications 
depend upon. Leaf applications are things like TestDisk which is 
independent. Leaf applications can be updated more regularly and chances 
of regressions and the impact of any regressions is much less.

Also in some cases heavy backporting might result in more instability 
compared to just updating to the newer version since such backporting is 
very distribution dependent and is not widely tested and used by 
upstream projects and the community.

You might want to classify and treat applications differently and have a 
process for requesting exceptions if necessary.

Rahul