Fedora Project: Announcing New Direction

[Michael Knepher]

On Wed, 2003-09-24 at 08:28, Sean Estabrooks wrote:
> On 24 Sep 2003 09:51:20 -0500
> Bret Hughes <bhughes at elevating.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> > 
> > That helps, Thanks.  Now that  know the terms do we have afeel for how
> > long maintenance will be provided for older versions of Fedora?  Sorry
> > if this has been answered but to me this is the crux of the issue and
> > determines how often I need to reinstall.
> 
> 2-3 months after next release.  So there will be maintenance releases for
> about half to three quarters of a year.
> 
I think the expectation now is that when, for example, a security patch
for openssh is released upstream as a new version (with perhaps a few
new features added), the new version will be incorporated into Fedora
Core, as opposed to the traditional method of backporting the fix. 

>From the FAQ: 
Q: What is the errata policy for The Fedora Project? 
A:
Security updates, bugfix updates, and new feature updates will all be
available, through Red Hat and third parties. Updates may be staged
(first made available for public qualification, then later for general
consumption) when appropriate. In drastic cases, we may remove a package
from The Fedora Project if we judge that a necessary security update is
too problematic/disruptive to the larger goals of the project.
Availability of updates should not be misconstrued as support for
anything other than continued development and innovation of the code
base.

Red Hat will not be providing an SLA (Service Level Agreement) for
resolution times for updates for The Fedora Project. Security updates
will take priority. For packages maintained by external parties, Red Hat
may respond to security holes by deprecating packages if the external
maintainers do not provide updates in a reasonable time. Users who want
support, or maintenance according to an SLA, may purchase the
appropriate Red Hat Enterprise Linux product for their use.

> > 
> > Secondly, If RH decides that it will only provide maint. for say, 3
> > versions back, is there something that the developer community can do to
> > take some of the work off Red Hat and enable the provision of
> > maintenance for a longer period?

I think that's the whole point of the Fedora Project.

See this page, especially the bit about Fedora Legacy:
http://fedora.redhat.com/participate/terminology.html

> > 
> 
> Sure.   but that's not going to satisfy the segment of people who want to
> have a guarantee from RedHat that the updates will be provided.   For them
> Enterprise is the only choice.
> 
> Sean.

They should find like-minded potential customers and flood Red Hat's
sales department with requests for some additional pricing/support
tiers, and legitimate suggestions for what they're actually willing/able
to pay for such guarantees.