[Pkg-xen-devel] Xen status in lenny?

[Lucas Nussbaum]

On 12/07/08 at 12:03 -0700, Steve Langasek wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 12:18:51PM +0200, Lucas Nussbaum wrote:
> > > > What are the plans for Xen for lenny? Is this situation likely to change
> > > > before the release?
> 
> > > It will ship the hypervisor and a domU kernel. For dom0 it will need
> > > either the etch or my own[1] kernel. This may be changed later if we can
> > > get a new kernel in the stable release.
> 
> > The problem I see with that is that people will be left without a
> > supported dom0 kernel at some point during the etch lifetime. Do we have
> > a plan to address that? Shouldn't we make it clear that we will support
> > the etch kernel until a lenny+1/2 kernel is available, for example?
> 
> Which "we" do you expect will support it?  I haven't heard any comments from
> the security team indicating that they're willing to provide support for
> such a stale kernel beyond the normal support lifetime of etch.  If there
> should happen not to be a lenny+1/2 kernel, how long would the security team
> be expected to provide security support for 2.6.18?  Until the release of
> lenny+1?  Until the end of the *lenny* support cycle?
> 
> > Wouldn't it be a good idea to ship a linux 2.6.18 kernel in lenny, only
> > for dom0, so it's clear that it is supported?
> 
> I think the first question to resolve is to establish that it *is*
> supported...

If nothing changes, the only choice for users will be to run an etch
dom0 (or an etch dom0 kernel with a lenny userland, but that doesn't
change much). An etch dom0 will only be supported until the end of the
etch support cycle. After that, users will need a supported upgrade
path (and I would prefer it not to be "use Ubuntu").

We (Debian) should make a clear statement that users of Debian as dom0
will have at least one supported configuration at any time during the
lenny lifetime.

Shipping an additional 2.6.18 kernel in lenny is just one extreme
solution. Another solution might work too, like stating that we (Debian)
will support the etch dom0 kernel until a dom0 kernel is available in
lenny (+ an interim period), even if the support cycle for etch ends
before that.
-- 
| Lucas Nussbaum
| lucas at lucas-nussbaum.net   http://www.lucas-nussbaum.net/ |
| jabber: lucas at nussbaum.fr             GPG: 1024D/023B3F4F |