Re: Embedded Linux Flag Version

[Nicolas Pitre <nicolas.pitre@linaro.org>]

On Tue, 9 Nov 2010, Nicholas Mc Guire wrote:

> On Tue, 09 Nov 2010, Tim Bird wrote:
> 
> > On 11/09/2010 03:19 AM, Mike Frysinger wrote:
> > > On Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 18:07, Tim Bird wrote:
> > >> It was noted at the summit that several CE companies and embedded
> > >> projects will be using (or are already using) 2.6.35 for upcoming
> > >> products or releases. This includes Sony, Google, Meego, and Linaro. On
> > >> behalf of the CE Linux Forum and a number of consumer electronics
> > >> companies, projects and community developers, we therefore declare
> > >> 2.6.35 as a flag version of the kernel for embedded use. Several
> > >> companies will be investing in development, integration and testing of
> > >> this version. Entities wanting to do business with those companies would
> > >> therefore be well-advised to make sure their hardware, drivers and
> > >> enhancements work well with this version of the kernel.
> > > 
> > > wouldnt it make more sense to piggy back the extensive work going into
> > > the "stable" tree ?  many of the points you raise after all are the
> > > entire founding point of it.  plus, all the main distros form around
> > > that, are spending time working on that, is marked as supported for 2
> > > or 3 years, and there is already infrastructure/framework/process in
> > > place (stable@kernel.org).
> > > 
> > > so instead of picking arbitrary versions (like 2.6.35) and needlessly
> > > replicating the huge work load, simply declare these stable trees as
> > > the "flag" versions.  that means today it'd be 2.6.32.y.
> > 
> > The fact that this tree is already a year old, and not likely to be
> > brought forward for at least another 2 years is the reason we didn't
> > choose it this time.  Most of the high-profile, active embedded projects
> > are already on 2.6.35.  For companies looking to adopt a new base kernel
> > in the next 12 months, I don't want to have them start with a year-old
> > kernel.  We did consider the utility of synchronizing with the enterprise
> > stable tree, but the timing just didn't work too well this time around.
> >
> I guess one of the key issues is that it would need to be defined beforehand
> what version will be used as the next "flag" version so vendors could make
> sure that there drivers are available. Further if such a selection were to
> be made then there would need to be consesus on maintaining the respective
> version for a sufficiently long time to allow for the next "flag" version
> to evolve. Finally for those working on products even if you would now define
> the current version as the "flag" version it would not help much as they
> would hardly be able to shift to a different kernel short term - so again the
> key is defining what version would be atleast planed for the next "flag" 
> version - something like now defining it to be 2.6.38 - and then testing 
> appropriately in the runup to 2.6.38 to deliver, most notably for the 
> embedded architectures.

FWIW, the imminent Linaro release is using 2.6.35.  The next release 
scheduled for May 2011 will most probably use 2.6.38.


Nicolas