Re: [RFC PATCH] docs/about/build-platforms: Refine the distro support policy

["Daniel P. Berrangé" <berrange@redhat.com>]

On Fri, Feb 17, 2023 at 03:44:23PM +0100, Paolo Bonzini wrote:
> On 2/17/23 14:26, Thomas Huth wrote:
> > Note: These changes mean that openSUSE is not considered as supported
> > anymore (since version 15.0 has been released in May 2018), and
> > RHEL/CentOS 8 will not be supported anymore in 3 months (since version
> > 8.0 has been released in May 2019).
> > 
> > Signed-off-by: Thomas Huth <thuth@redhat.com>
> 
> This has the advantage of being a very simple change to the support policy.
> However, it has the disadvantage that at this point both SLE15 and RHEL8 are
> not hard to support _at run-time_, only the build is a bit problematic; so,
> it kinda throws away the baby with the bathwater.

I think it could be a little fuzzy. I agree if thinking about
QEMU.git in isolation.

If we consider that python-qemu-qmp.git is conceptually positioned
as a general purpose QEMU python client, that would extend to runtime
support.

We could define a separate support policy for python-qemu-qmp.git,
but if we're intending to delete the in-tree python QMP code and
use python-qemu-qmp.git directly, then its support policy does
interact with qemu.git.

> I have posted another RFC at https://lore.kernel.org/qemu-devel/20230217124150.205012-1-pbonzini@redhat.com;
> they share the 4 year deadline but it only applies to non-native
> dependencies (which means Python right now).
> 
> Thanks for posting this, it's useful to have two different possibilities to
> compare.
> 
> Paolo
> 
> > ---
> >   docs/about/build-platforms.rst | 9 +++++----
> >   1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)
> > 
> > diff --git a/docs/about/build-platforms.rst b/docs/about/build-platforms.rst
> > index 1c1e7b9e11..cdc38f16a4 100644
> > --- a/docs/about/build-platforms.rst
> > +++ b/docs/about/build-platforms.rst
> > @@ -67,10 +67,11 @@ Non-supported architectures may be removed in the future following the
> >   Linux OS, macOS, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD
> >   -----------------------------------------
> > -The project aims to support the most recent major version at all times. Support
> > -for the previous major version will be dropped 2 years after the new major
> > -version is released or when the vendor itself drops support, whichever comes
> > -first. In this context, third-party efforts to extend the lifetime of a distro
> > +The project aims to support the most recent major version at all times for
> > +up to four years after its initial release. Support for the previous major
> > +version will be dropped one years after the new major version is released
> > +or when the vendor itself drops support, whichever comes first.
> > +In this context, third-party efforts to extend the lifetime of a distro
> >   are not considered, even when they are endorsed by the vendor (eg. Debian LTS);
> >   the same is true of repositories that contain packages backported from later
> >   releases (e.g. Debian backports). Within each major release, only the most
> 

With regards,
Daniel
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