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Xref: sserve comp.unix.aix:49067 comp.unix.bsd:15621 comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit:7790 comp.unix.solaris:28578 comp.unix.unixware:15371 Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!news.hawaii.edu!ames!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!math.ohio-state.edu!caen!usenet.coe.montana.edu!bsd.coe.montana.edu!nate From: nate@bsd.coe.montana.edu (Nate Williams) Newsgroups: comp.unix.aix,comp.unix.bsd,comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit,comp.unix.solaris,comp.unix.unixware Subject: Re: Unix for PC Date: 8 Dec 1994 20:34:58 GMT Organization: Montana State University, Bozeman Montana Lines: 50 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <3c7qli$glm@pdq.coe.montana.edu> References: <199411210319.TAA18133@nic.cerf.net> <D0E32G.3x8@news.cern.ch> <D0G3ys.DB6@novell.co.uk> <D0I7Fq.C1p@news.cern.ch> NNTP-Posting-Host: bsd.coe.montana.edu In article <D0I7Fq.C1p@news.cern.ch>, Dan Pop <danpop@cernapo.cern.ch> wrote: >It's simple. Novell knows that version X has undiscovered bugs and >releases test versions, for those who, at their risks, want to test that >version. The testers find bugs, report them, and Novell fixes them. If only it were that simple..... >In the Linux world, the testing is performed in the same way. Not even close. In Linux, you never know what bugs are fixed unless you want to get the mailing list traffic, and your bug might be fixed at the same time as another one is introduced. There is no one-one mapping from bug-fixes to releases. Towards the end this happens, but as a general rule it doesn't occur. And, the statement 'you can always run the stable 1.0' release doesn't cut it. There are MONSTER bugs in that branch that have never been fixed since they 'might' introduce instabilities. However, those bugs make it useless to put that machine on a network, and the 1.1 branch has not slowed down enough in the patches that you can grab a revision and know that it's going to work. With commercial software at least you can get fixes for things advertised in *your* release that fix bugs that *you* need. Yes, there are horror stories about things never getting fixed, but as a general rule things get done if enough people complain about them, and the generic functionality expected out of most commercial OS's is still not 'quite' there in Linux. When 1.2 is out I expect this to change, since networking should be much more stable (Let's hope the scheduling changes go in as well). >If your "argument" is valid for free OS's, it's necessarily valid for >commercial OS's, too. That's all. C'mon Dan. Commercial OS software testing is completely different than free software testing in general. The reason Linux and FreeBSD have more features than the commercial x86 versions sooner is because stability is not as important as 'feeping creaturism'. Features comes first, and stability comes second. And, it's a lot more fun to do things that way. :-) Nate -- nate@bsd.coe.montana.edu | FreeBSD dude and all around tech. nate@cs.montana.edu | weenie. work #: (406) 994-5980 | Unemployed, looking for permanant work in home #: (406) 586-0579 | CS/EE field.