[DRBD-user] URGENT Request for DRBD Developers

Art Age Software artagesw at gmail.com
Fri May 23 21:50:08 CEST 2008

Note: "permalinks" may not be as permanent as we would like,
direct links of old sources may well be a few messages off.


Johnny, Based on the tone of your  reply, it seems that I have offended you. I
apologize if that is the case, as it was certainly not my intention.

> Don't you think it is the developers of CentOS who should decide what goes
> in it.  I am WELL aware of what he purpose of CentOS is.  I use it in
> production on hundreds of servers all over the world.

Yes, I do believe this. But I also believe that the CentOS developers
are not infallible and should be open to feedback from the user
community. I hope you agree.

> In the just released RHEL-5.2 they have moved to firefox-3b5 (a BETA
> version), and thunderbird-2 from firefox-1.5 and thnderbird-1.5.  They moved
> from OpenOffice-2.0 to 2.3. They upgraded xen to 3.1.  There are several
> release candidate versions of software in RHEL-5, including alsa, dmraid and
> autofs (among others).

By and large this tends to be the case more for desktop packages than
for server packages (although there are of course exceptions). DRBD is
such a mission-critical component of a high-availability architecture
that I think it warrants a higher degree of care than some of these
other packages - just by virtue of its use case - keeping services
running and available.

>> The 8.0.x branch is the **stable** branch. It gets bug fixes and
>> security fixes only, **not** new feature development. It is inherently
>> more stable than the 8.2 branch.
>>
>
> Lets see what the DRBD developers say about that.  My understanding is that
> BOTH are stable.  Maybe I am wrong.

Sure. But wouldn't you agree that one can be considered "more stable"
than the other? If you develop software, then you know that 8.2.x must
be considered less stable just by virtue of the fact that newer
less-tested features are going into it.

>> DRBD 8.2.x is where the bleeding edge feature development happens, and
>> it is much more appropriate for Fedora or maybe for CentOSPlus. But
>> IMHO, it does not belong in CentOS as the **only** DRBD option.
>
> Again ... don't you think that the people who test and develop the software
> should decide what goes in it?

Yes, again, with feedback from the user community when appropriate.
All I am trying to do is provide you that feedback. As a community
member and supporter of CentOS, I feel that I have that right, no?

> I had MANY requests to upgrade DRBD to version 8.2.

Is there some reason that this request could not have been fulfilled
by adding 8.2 to CentOSPlus and leaving 8.0 in Extras? Would that not
have satisfied the requests for 8.2 without breaking things for those
of us who for very good reasons choose to remain with 8.0 for now?

> I am sorry if you do not agree with me on package version, BUT, the DRBD
> developers SAY that 8.2 IS stable.  They also roll changes into 8.0.x first
> for testing .. THEN they roll them into 8.2.x.  In fact, the 8.0.12 changes
> will be in 8.2.6, which will be released soon.  One could  argue that since
> 8.0 things get tested before inclusion into 8.2, that it is 8.2 that is more
> stable.

This is a valid point. But it is counter-balanced by the fact that the
addition of new features to 8.2 decreases stability relative to 8.0.

> Regardless I'll listen what the DRBD devels say, but my understanding is
> that 8.2 is stable in much the same way as the 2.6 kernel ... there will be
> development while it is maintained as stable.  So, 3 years down the road,
> when they decide to not maintain 8.0 any more, and when there are still 4
> years left for CentOS-5, AND when the upgrade from 8.0 to 8.2 is no longer
> automatic because of protocol changes, then you MIGHT appreciate my decision
> a bit more ... but then again, maybe you won't.

OK, no need for digs. I do appreciate the hard work that you and all
the CentOS developers do. In this particular case, however, I think
your decision had farther-reaching impact than was your intention. I
believe it was a mistake and could/should be corrected. I don't expect
CentOS developers to always "get it right" and I don't expect them to
always agree with their user base. But I do expect that when a change
like this has a dramatic impact on users, that they will listen to the
feedback and carefully consider it rather than dismiss it out of hand
- which is how I feel the response to my initial bug report was
handled. Hopefully, you agree that this is a reasonable expectation.

Thanks,

Sam



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