[Nix-dev] Policy for updates in 14.04 (was: Keeping nixpkgs up to date)

[Lluís Batlle i Rossell]

Almost any software update will contain a bunch of bugfixes and only sometimes new
features.

And for lots of nixpkgs software, having the update in master, doesn't guarantee
that it is much tested once it becomes stable.

I'd prefer to have a less strict rule about updating the stable branch, and act
based on problems arisen. I'd avoid to set too strict rules before the problems
arise, otherwise the discussion becomes ethereal.

Depending on the strictness, few are going to use the stable branch. For me, I
choose more the stable branch for much less rebuilds. No mesa updates, no X
updates, no qt updates, no gtk udpates, etc... 

Regards,
Lluís.

On Sun, Aug 31, 2014 at 05:57:52PM +0200, Peter Simons wrote:
> Hi Chris,
> 
>  > <https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/pull/3136>
>  >
>  > Updating Tor on 14.04 to version 0.2.4.22 and Tor Browser to 3.6.2.
>  > This has been sitting for two months. Since then a newer version of
>  > Tor and Tor Browser has come out so it's already out of date.
> 
> the stable release branch is not supposed to have up-to-date software.
> Its purpose is to provide a software environment that is *stable*.
> Packages in the release branch should be modified only if the update
> fixes an important bug, like a security vulnerability, i.e. when the
> cost of sticking to the old version is obviously higher than the risk of
> breaking someone's system with an update. If that is not the case, then
> the update should probably not go to the release branch.
> 
> Best regards,
> Peter
> 
> _______________________________________________
> nix-dev mailing list
> nix-dev at lists.science.uu.nl
> http://lists.science.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/nix-dev