On Mon, Sep 13, 2021 at 10:18:54AM -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: > I'm a former Gentoo user, and really appreciated the rolling release > aspect, since it meant no huge jumps between LTS releases with other > distros. > > So... what is the current LTS version and when is its EOL, and when will > the next one be released, and what will be its EOL?
Debian doesn't have "LTS versions" in the way you're thinking. Every Debian release goes through the same lifecycle: 1) Prior to release, a given version undergoes a period as "testing". Users are free to install it and play around with it and report bugs. 2) After a while of that, a release date is chosen. The release goes into "freeze" (varying stages, actually), and no new stuff is allowed in. Bugs are fixed, or if a package can't be fixed up, it's removed. 3) When the release date arrives, the version goes from "testing" to "stable". Celebrations happen, etc. 4) During its time as "stable", a release gets no new versions of software (except in special situations), and no bug fixes other than security or major bugs. 5) When a new stable release happens, the previous release becomes "oldstable". It still receives security bug fix support for a year. 6) After that year, the release goes into "long-term support" mode, and received security bug fix support from a different team. The LTS team may choose to support only server packages, not desktop packages. 7) After about 2 years of LTS support, the release reached end of life, and is no longer officially supported.
