On 2004-04-14, Gregory Seidman penned: > > Hm. Too long for my taste. People aren't going to bother typing > something that long in IRC. I'd say we want pithy but clear. How about: > > stable ---> lowrisk > testing --> current > unstable -> earlyaccess > > I can see an argument that testing should not be called current, since > CURRENT means something different in the BSD world. At the same time, > consider how the releases are actually used. The stable distribution is > most suitable for a) installation, and b) stable, high-security, > low-risk servers. The testing distribution is used for desktop machines > because it has current software, but is unlikely to break randomly (yes, > it still happens occasionally). The unstable distribution is used > package-by-package on many testing-based machines, and is also used by > savvy sysadmins who consider access to the latest software versions > worth the risk of broken packages. > > That said, I think testing could be equally well named either > workstation or nearcurrent and achieve the same goals.
My understanding of the 'testing' distribution is in conflict with your description. Testing is the last to receive security updates, and I believe it is more prone to wide-ranging package bugs than is unstable. I see it more as a developer sandbox than a live distribution. Am I wrong? > Just in case I didn't make it clear earlier, I consider this a > usability/documentation issue, not a marketing issue. The intended > result of any name change is a reduction in (repetitive) questions to > the mailing lists and IRC channels. I think it will be difficult/impossible to come up with a short name for each of these that also communicates their characteristics. At the very least, though, the versions list on the debian website should take a stab at explaining the tradeoffs. -- monique -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
