[CentOS-devel] Balancing the needs around the CentOS platform

On 12/19/20 8:27 PM, Nico Kadel-Garcia wrote:
> On Sat, Dec 19, 2020 at 12:29 PM Matthew Miller <mattdm at mattdm.org> wrote:
>> It's important to note that the CentOS Linux rebuild never actually had
>> this. RHEL minor releases are actually branches, and you can stay at a minor
>> release and still get security updates.
> Are you saying the
> CentOS point releases do *not* match as closely as possible the
> corresponding RHEL point release?


No, no one is saying that.  Matthew said that you can stay at a minor 
release of RHEL and still get security updates.  CentOS does not offer that.

In RHEL, a minor release is a branch.  You can install RHEL 7.8, and 
keep a host on RHEL 7.8 until the end of its life cycle.  If you want 
long term support for an OS with minimal changes, but continued support, 
that's a thing that RHEL provides.

CentOS doesn't offer that.  If you're using CentOS, you're always on the 
"latest" branch.  You either apply feature updates that come with each 
point release to get security updates, or you stop applying updates 
entirely and run the risks that come with not applying security or 
bugfix updates.

Mark is confusing the issue somewhat.  I *think* he is trying to say 
that when we say that CentOS point releases have no branches, we're 
saying that there's no QA, which is absolutely not what we're saying.  
We're not talking about the back end development process, we're talking 
about the products that are delivered to customers.  Customers can 
choose what branch of the RHEL product to deploy on their systems, and 
how long to use a given point release.  CentOS users don't get that 
level of support.