[CentOS-devel] CentOS stream meeting - update

[Paul Graydon]

Thanks for the update Rich, I just want to raise one point that might 
not have been considered.

On 10/8/19 08:37, Rich Bowen wrote:
> Q: How many streams will there be? Will there be a stream for 8 and
> another for 9?
> A: When the development for RHEL 9 begins, the stream for 8 will end. We
> plan to have a one-year overlap, to allow for transition from one stream
> to the other. But we do not intend to keep the 8 Stream going for the
> entirety of the RHEL 8 support window.

To quote from earlier in your email "This will allow you to experiment 
with the next version before it releases, and ensure that what you are 
working on will work, day one, when the next minor release of RHEL is 
announced.  SIGs, too, will be able to build and test against this 
preview, so that when the next minor release comes out, there will be no 
surprises"

I'm somewhat surprised by the plan to stop the 8 Stream, once the 9 
Stream starts up.  Even once the work on a future major version starts, 
there are still minor releases happening on the released version, which 
come with noteworthy changes and updates, e.g. 7.7 just got released a 
few months back, when the 8 beta was out. 7.7 included numerous changes 
and new features, drivers and improvements 
(https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/7/html/7.7_release_notes/new_features). 
I'm guessing that development for RedHat 8 has been more than a year in 
the works!

I appreciate that you do tend to limit the scope a bit more with the 
later point releases, but stopping the Stream at that point seems like 
it would go completely against the intent declared earlier, because at 
least based on past RedHat development and release approaches, there 
will be RHEL 8 minor releases still coming out with notable changes more 
than a year after development work on RHEL 9 would have started.

Paul