• Updated freeze policy for bullseye and (tentative) freeze dates

    From Paul Gevers@21:1/5 to All on Thu Mar 12 13:50:01 2020
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    Dear all,

    As promised [1], here is another Bits from the release team. This time,
    we'll inform you about our updated freeze policy for the bullseye
    release and our (tentative) freeze dates.


    Changes to the freeze policy
    ============================

    For the bullseye release, we have updated our freeze policy. An
    up-to-date copy can always be found on our web-site at [2]. There are
    some changes with respect to the buster freeze policy that we like to
    mention here (for full details, read [2]).

    1. We have extended the Transition Freeze to include packages that are (transitively) part of (build-)essential, so it's now called the
    Transition and (build-)essentials Freeze. If you maintain any of said
    packages, we expect you stop uploading them at the start of the Freeze.
    If you think changes are needed anyway, please coordinate with the
    release team before uploading to unstable. Consider staging changes in experimental.

    2. We have introduced a new milestone between the Soft Freeze and the
    Full Freeze, dubbed the Hard Freeze. During the Hard Freeze, key
    packages and packages without (non-trivial) autopkgtests are
    automatically blocked from migrating. These packages will require a
    manual unblock from the release team to migrate, just like in the Full
    Freeze.

    For other package (i.e. non-key packages with (non-trivial)
    autopkgtests), we expect maintainers to follow the rules of our freeze
    policy. However, to reduce the workload for package maintainers and the
    release team, we will not automatically fully block packages during most
    of the freeze. These packages will be allowed to migrate after 20 days
    if they meet the regular Soft Freeze requirements. For these package,
    there is no need to ask for an unblock.

    3. During the Full freeze, all packages will require a manual unblock.
    We only intend to start the Full Freeze shortly before the actual
    release of bullseye. The starting date of the Full Freeze will be
    decided when we start planning a release date and will be announced at
    least 14 days before it comes into effect.

    4. We have made it more explicit in our policy that you should only
    upload changes to unstable during the freeze that are targeted at
    bullseye.

    5. We have extended some examples of appropriate and non-appropriate
    changes during the freeze and we have added a FAQ [3] for unblocks. We
    intend to expand and update this FAQ as we're progressing in the freeze.


    Freeze dates
    ============

    We are currently considering the following dates as our freeze dates.
    There not totally set in stone yet, but we don't expect us to change
    them.

    2021-01-12 - Milestone 1 - Transition and (build-)essentials freeze 2021-02-12 - Milestone 2 - Soft Freeze
    2021-03-12 - Milestone 3 - Hard Freeze - for key packages and
    packages without autopkgtests
    To be announced - Milestone 4 - Full Freeze


    Feedback
    ========

    We hope that our freeze policy gives a clear description of the coming
    freeze. However, if you find some parts of our policy to be unclear,
    please reach out to us so we can discuss how to make it clearer.


    On behalf of the Release Team,
    Paul

    [1] https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2020/02/msg00005.html
    [2] https://release.debian.org/bullseye/freeze_policy.html
    [3] https://release.debian.org/bullseye/FAQ.html
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