openSUSE packagers' take on the 3 month release cycle

[Luca Beltrame]

(apologies for breaking your threading, but I'm not subscribed to k-c-d; in 
fact, please CC me with replies, thanks!)

Currently, the people working on openSUSE packages are against the proposal. A 
detailed explanation follows.

First and foremost, the KDE packaging in openSUSE is almost completely 
community driven. This means that most of the work is done by volounteers 
which handle what they can in their (limited) time. Faster releases may mean 
worse packaging and increased maintenance (and I think this is also an issue 
w/most non rolling distros).

Additionally, there are a number of concerns regarding maintainability which 
are openSUSE specific: since the distro has an 8 month release cycle and there 
is support for current version and current version-1, we make available newer 
releases from KDE in specific repositories on the Open Build Service, and 
additionally we submit minor releases from KDE as official updates for the 
distribution.

The 3-month workflow would not only strain the work within the packaging (some 
of us track the development versions and know how can they become moving 
targets) but also on the whole infrastructure:

- providing updated packages in the extra repositories will require more work
- this would also cause an additional strain for supplying updates

Also, despite the fact that no one is forced to have the latest and greatest, 
there is the issue with user support (as I see in the KDE Community Forums, 
speaking with my forum admin hat on) where issues are fixed already but 
distros don't carry the required updates. So this would be detrimental for the 
distribution(s) anyway.

Therefore, the only logical conclusion is -1 to this proposal. 

-- 
Luca Beltrame - KDE Forums team
KDE Science supporter
GPG key ID: 6E1A4E79
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