[CentOS-devel] CentOS Stream and major releases

Sat Oct 5 15:28:39 UTC 2019
Mason Loring Bliss <mason at blisses.org>

I'm pretty sure I understand the workflow, or what will be the workflow, for
CentOS Stream and RHEL, but there's one thing I'm curious about that I'd love
to have clarified, at least to the extent that it's been planned or thought
about so far:

Historically, a major release of RHEL has been cut from Fedora and polished up
(or chopped down or...) but now that CentOS Stream exists, I can see several
paths forward.

One possibility I envision is that CStream will progress at about the same
pace as RHEL point releases today, which would suggest that when it comes time
to branch something for RHEL 9, that might once again be Fedora, with the
branch then being a major release of CStream that'll be polished into what
will be released as RHEL 9.0.

Another possibility is that CStream will move somewhat quicker, with point
releases over time covering more ground, somewhat obviating the notion of a
major release - but this would conflict with the notion of a stable platform
for vendors and partners to use as a long-lived base for their products, so I
suspect it's not the answer.

A third possibility is that when RHEL 8 slows down [1] and there wouldn't
normally be another point release of it, CStream will pick up pace and make
bigger changes until it rolls forward to where RHEL 9 will pick up. This is
the one I'm hoping for personally, as it would keep CStream as a continuous
rolling release, and appropriate for situations where you'd want a rolling
release. (There's no official equivalent to Leapp for CentOS, but this would
mean that CStream wouldn't need one.)

Is the current thinking close to one of these, or are there options I've
missed?

Thanks.

1. https://access.redhat.com/support/policy/updates/errata/

-- 
Mason Loring Bliss             mason at blisses.org            Ewige Blumenkraft!
(if awake 'sleep (aref #(sleep dream) (random 2))) -- Hamlet, Act III, Scene I
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