On Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 05:28:33PM +0100, Thomas Bellman wrote: > > Kyle Cordes wrote: > > > At the risk of being too far offtopic here on the Puppet list: I > > wonder if there are, or will be, any wide-use distributions that work > > differently, that update incrementally rather than a whole "release" > > at a time. I imagine a world where I installed once and never upgraded > > a distro release, but rather got new versions of everything a bit at > > time. This could easily create more trouble than it solves, > > obviously. > > Gentoo Linux works that way. Works pretty well, actually.
It works fine for hackers, it doesn't work nearly well for people administering large systems that have to be stable. OK, since this has come up, here is why Debian doesn't backport bug fixes and why versions are frozen: simply, people administering large networks of hosts need to know that they won't break in the course of normal operations. Because Debian only backports security fixes, you can safely have your large network pegged to stable and run 'apt-get upgrade' when there are security updates, knowing that the updated packages will not break your systems in any way. The problem with upgrading to newer versions of sofware is that the newer version often has new features or new behaviour or has a completely different configuration file format. While good package design can get you past some of that, by providing intelligently designed upgrade scripts, there is only so much these can protect you (not that the Gentoo developers even try, most of the time). So it's desirable not to have version upgrades except where you really want them and have planned them and the Stable distribution guarantees this. For most of the packages installed on a system it doesn't matter that they are slightly out of date: if their features at the time of installation were good enough for the job then they remain good enough. Where you really need a newer version, you can roll your own or rebuild the Testing or Unstable package for Stable (not normally very hard) or investigate the Backports or Volatile repositories. The point is, you only create as much disruption and extra work as you want, no more. There's nothing in Gentoo's design to stop it offering the same advantages (although the configuration management tools are still neolithic and really need some work - package upgrades causing breakages is still one of the biggest headaches for the average Gentoo user), but it won't be able to offer that until a proper Stable Portage tree has been set up, along with better packaging policy and discipline. > > (There are some limitations in the implementation of Gentoo's package > system, Portage, that sometimes makes the incremental upgrades somewhat > painful, but they are limitations with the implementation, not with the > concept.) The only way to take away the pain of cascade upgrades is to absolutely remove the possibility of cascade upgrades, by having a Stable Portage tree. Unfortunately, the few efforts to make this happen have all failed in the face of apathy and indifference. -- Bruce I see a mouse. Where? There, on the stair. And its clumsy wooden footwear makes it easy to trap and kill. -- Harry Hill --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Puppet Users" group. To post to this group, send email to puppet-users@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to puppet-users+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/puppet-users?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
