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| -rw-r--r-- | release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/Makefile | 14 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/article.sgml | 418 |
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diff --git a/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/Makefile b/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/Makefile new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a237b09 --- /dev/null +++ b/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/Makefile @@ -0,0 +1,14 @@ +# $FreeBSD$ + +DOC?= article + +FORMATS?= html + +INSTALL_COMPRESSED?=gz +INSTALL_ONLY_COMPRESSED?= + +SRCS= article.sgml + +DOC_PREFIX?= /usr/doc + +.include "${DOC_PREFIX}/share/mk/doc.project.mk" diff --git a/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/article.sgml b/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/article.sgml new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d19eaaa --- /dev/null +++ b/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/early-adopter/article.sgml @@ -0,0 +1,418 @@ +<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//DTD DocBook V4.1-Based Extension//EN" [ +<!ENTITY % man PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//ENTITIES DocBook Manual Page Entities//EN"> +%man; + +<!ENTITY % freebsd PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//ENTITIES DocBook Miscellaneous FreeBSD Entities//EN"> +%freebsd; + +<!ENTITY % authors PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//ENTITIES DocBook Author Entities//EN"> +%authors; + +<!ENTITY % teams PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//ENTITIES DocBook Team Entities//EN"> +%teams; + +<!ENTITY % mailing-lists PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//ENTITIES DocBook Mailing List Entities//EN"> +%mailing-lists; +]> + +<article> + <articleinfo> + <title>Early Adopter's Guide to FreeBSD 5.0-RELEASE</title> + + <authorgroup> + <corpauthor>The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team</corpauthor> + </authorgroup> + + <pubdate>$FreeBSD$</pubdate> + + <copyright> + <year>2002</year> + <holder role="mailto:re@FreeBSD.org">The FreeBSD Release + Engineering Team</holder> + </copyright> + </articleinfo> + + <section> + <title>Introduction</title> + + <para>FreeBSD 5.0 marks the first new major version of FreeBSD in + over two years. Besides a number of new features, it also + contains a number of major developments in the underlying system + architecture. + Along with these advances, however, comes a system that + incorporates a tremendous amount of new and not-widely-tested + code. Compared to the existing line of + 4.<replaceable>X</replaceable> releases, 5.0 may have regressions + in areas of stability, performance, and occasionally + functionality.</para> + + <para>For these reasons, the &a.re; does <emphasis>not</emphasis> + encourage users to blindly update from older FreeBSD releases to + 5.0. Specifically, for more conservative users, we recommend + running 4.<replaceable>X</replaceable> releases (such as + 4.7-RELEASE or the upcoming 4.8-RELEASE) for the near-term + future. We feel that such users are probably best served by + upgrading to 5.<replaceable>X</replaceable> only after a + 5-STABLE development branch has been created; this may be around + the time of 5.1-RELEASE or 5.2-RELEASE.</para> + + <para>(FreeBSD 5.0 suffers from what has been described as a + <quote>chicken and egg</quote> problem. The entire project has + a goal of producing a 5.0-RELEASE that is as stable and reliable + as possible. This stability and reliability requires widespread + testing, particularly of the system's newer features. However, + getting a large number of users to test the system, in a + practical sense, means building and distributing a + release first!)</para> + + <para>This article describes some of the issues involved in + installing and running FreeBSD 5.0-RELEASE. We begin with a + brief overview of the FreeBSD release process. We then present + some of the more noteworthy new features in FreeBSD 5.0, along + with some areas that may prove troublesome for unwary users. + For those users choosing to remain with 4-STABLE-based releases, + we give some of the short- to medium-term plans for this + development branch. Finally, we present some notes on upgrading + existing 4.<replaceable>X</replaceable> systems to 5.0.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>An Overview of the FreeBSD Release Process</title> + + <para>FreeBSD employs a model of development that relies on multiple + development branches within the source code repository. The main branch is called + <quote>CURRENT</quote>, and is referred to in the CVS repository + with the <literal>HEAD</literal> tag. New features are + committed first to this branch; although this means that CURRENT + is the first to see new functionality, it also means that it + occasionally suffers from breakages as new features are + added and debugged.</para> + + <para>Most FreeBSD releases are made from one of several + <quote>STABLE</quote> branches. Features are only added to + these branches after some amount of testing in CURRENT. At the + moment, only one STABLE branch is under active development; this + branch is referred to as <quote>4-STABLE</quote>, and all of the + FreeBSD 4.<replaceable>X</replaceable> releases were based on + it. This branch has the tag <literal>RELENG_4</literal> in the + CVS repository.</para> + + <para>FreeBSD 5.0 will be based on the CURRENT branch. This + will be the first release from this branch in over two years (the + last was FreeBSD 4.0, in March 2000).</para> + + <para>At some point after the release of FreeBSD 5.0, a + <quote>5-STABLE</quote> branch will be created in the FreeBSD + CVS repository with the branch tag <literal>RELENG_5</literal>. + The past two stable branches (3-STABLE and 4-STABLE) were + created immediately after their respective <quote>dot-oh</quote> + releases (3.0 and 4.0, respectively). In hindsight, this + practice did not give sufficient time for either CURRENT or the new + STABLE branches to stabilize after the new branches were + created.</para> + + <para>Therefore, the release engineering team will only create the + 5-STABLE branch in the CVS repository after they have found a + relatively stable state to use as its basis. It is likely that + there will be + multiple releases in the 5.<replaceable>X</replaceable> series + before this happens; we estimate + that the 5-STABLE branch will be created sometime after + 5.1-RELEASE or 5.2-RELEASE.</para> + + <para>More information on FreeBSD release engineering processes can be found + on the <ulink + url="http://www.FreeBSD.org/releng/index.html">Release + Engineering Web pages</ulink> and in the FreeBSD <ulink url="http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/releng/index.html">Release + Engineering</ulink> article.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>New Features</title> + + <para>A large attraction of FreeBSD 5.0 is a number of new + features. These new features and functionality generally involve + large architectural changes that were not feasible to port back to + the FreeBSD 4-STABLE development branch. (By contrast, many + self-contained enhancements, such as new device drivers or + userland utilities, have already been ported.) A brief, but not + exhaustive list includes:</para> + + <itemizedlist> + <listitem> + <para>SMPng: The <quote>next generation</quote> support for + SMP machines (work in progress). There is now partial + support for multiple processors to be running in the kernel + at the same time.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>KSE: Kernel Scheduled Entities allow a single process + to have multiple kernel-level threads, similar to Scheduler + Activations.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>New architectures: Support for the sparc64 and ia64 + architectures, in addition to the i386, pc98, and + alpha.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>GCC: The compiler toolchain is now based on GCC + 3.<replaceable>X</replaceable>, rather than GCC + 2.95.<replaceable>X</replaceable>.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>MAC: Support for extensible, loadable Mandatory Access + Control policies.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>GEOM: A flexible framework for transformations of disk + I/O requests. An experimental disk encryption facility has + been developed based on GEOM.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>FFS: The FFS filesystem now supports background + &man.fsck.8; operations (for faster crash recovery) and + filesystem snapshots.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>UFS2: A new UFS2 on-disk format has been added, which + supports extended per-file attributes and larger file + sizes.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>Cardbus: Support for Cardbus devices.</para> + </listitem> + + </itemizedlist> + + <para>A more comprehensive list of new features can be found in + the release notes for FreeBSD 5.0.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>Drawbacks to Early Adoption</title> + + <para>Along with the new features of FreeBSD 5.0 come some areas + that can cause problems, or at least can lead to unexpected + behavior. Generally, these come from the fact that a number of + features are works-in-progress. A partial list of these + areas of difficulty includes:</para> + + <itemizedlist> + + <listitem> + <para>A number of features are not yet finished. Examples + from the feature list above include SMPng and KSE.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>Because of changes in kernel data structures and + ABIs/APIs, third-party binary device drivers will require + modifications to work correctly under FreeBSD 5.0.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>Several parts of FreeBSD's base system functionality + have been moved to the Ports Collection. Notable examples + include <application>Perl</application>, + <application>UUCP</application>, and most (but not all) + games. While these programs are still supported, their + removal from the base system may cause some confusion.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>A number of ports and packages do not build or do not + run correctly under FreeBSD 5.0, whereas they did under FreeBSD + 4-STABLE. Generally these problems are caused by compiler + toolchain changes or cleanups of header files.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>Because FreeBSD 5.0 is the first release from the + CURRENT branch in over two years, many of its features are + seeing wide exposure for the first time. Many of these + features (such as SMPng) have broad impacts on the + kernel.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>A certain amount of debugging and diagnostic code is + still in place to help track down problems in FreeBSD 5.0's new + features. This may cause FreeBSD 5.0 to perform more slowly + than 4-STABLE.</para> + </listitem> + + <listitem> + <para>Features are only added to the 4-STABLE development + branch after a <quote>settling time</quote> in -CURRENT. + FreeBSD 5.0 does not have the stabilizing influence of a + -STABLE branch. (It is likely that the 5-STABLE development + branch will be created sometime after 5.1-RELEASE or + 5.2-RELEASE.)</para> + </listitem> + + </itemizedlist> + + <para>Because a number of these drawbacks affect system stability, the + release engineering team recommends that more conservative sites + and users stick to releases based on the 4-STABLE branch until + the 5.<replaceable>X</replaceable> series is more polished.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>Plans for the 4-STABLE Branch</title> + + <para>The release of FreeBSD 5.0 does not mean the end of the + 4-STABLE branch. There will be at least one more release on + this branch, namely 4.8-RELEASE, currently scheduled for 1 + February 2003.</para> + + <para>As of this writing, the release engineering team has no + definite plans for future releases (past 4.8) on the 4-STABLE + branch. However, a 4.9-RELEASE or even a 4.10-RELEASE are + likely possibilities. Any future releases from this branch will + depend on several factors. The most important of these + is the existence and stability of the 5-STABLE branch. If + CURRENT is not sufficiently stable to allow the creation of a + 5-STABLE branch, this may require and permit more releases from + the 4-STABLE branch. Until the last declared release + on the 4-STABLE branch, new features may be merged from HEAD at + the discretion of developers, subject to existing release + engineering policies.</para> + + <para>To some extent, the release engineering team will take into + account user demand for future 4-STABLE releases. This demand, + however, will need to be balanced with release engineering + resources (in terms of personnel, computing resources, and mirror + archive space).</para> + + <para>The &a.security-officer; will continue to support releases + made from the 4-STABLE branch in accordance with their published + policies, which can be found on the <ulink + url="http://www.FreeBSD.org/security/index.html">Security + page</ulink> on the FreeBSD web site. Generally, the two most + recent releases from any branch will be supported with respect + to security advisories and security fixes. At its discretion, + the team may support other releases.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>Notes on Upgrading</title> + + <para>For those users with existing FreeBSD systems, this section + offers a few notes on upgrading a FreeBSD + 4.<replaceable>X</replaceable> system to + 5.<replaceable>X</replaceable>. As with any FreeBSD upgrade, it + is crucial to read the release notes and the errata for the + version in question, as well as + <filename>src/UPGRADING</filename> for source upgrades.</para> + + <section> + <title>Binary Upgrades</title> + + <para>Probably the most straightforward approach is that of + <quote>backup everything, reformat, reinstall, and restore + everything</quote>. This eliminates problems of incompatible + or obsolete executables or configuration files polluting the + new system.</para> + + <para>As of this time, the binary upgrade option in + &man.sysinstall.8; has not been well-tested for + cross-major-version upgrades. Using this feature is not + recommended.</para> + + <para>On the i386 and pc98 platforms, a UserConfig utility + exists on 4-STABLE to allow boot-time configuration of ISA + devices when booting from installation media. Under FreeBSD + 5.0, this functionality has been replaced in part by the + &man.device.hints.5; mechanism (it allows specifying the same + parameters, but is not interactive).</para> + + <para>Floppy-based binary installations may require downloading + a third, new floppy image holding additional device drivers + in kernel modules. This <filename>drivers.flp</filename> + floppy image will generally be found in the same location as + the usual <filename>kern.flp</filename> and + <filename>mfsroot.flp</filename> floppy images.</para> + + <para>CDROM-based installations on the i386 architecture now use + a <quote>no-emulation</quote> boot loader. This allows, among + other things, the use of a <literal>GENERIC</literal> kernel, + rather than the stripped-down kernel on the floppy images. In + theory, any system capable of booting the Microsoft Windows NT + 4 installation CDROMs should be able to cope with the FreeBSD + 5.0 CDROMs.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>Source Upgrades</title> + + <para>Reading <filename>src/UPDATING</filename> is absolutely + essential. The section entitled <quote>To upgrade from + 4.x-stable to current</quote> contains a step-by-step update + procedure. This procedure must be followed exactly, without + using of the <quote>shortcuts</quote> that some users + occasionally employ.</para> + + </section> + + <section> + <title>Common Notes</title> + + <para><application>Perl</application> has been removed from the + base system. The recommended way of installing Perl is either + from a pre-built package or from the Ports Collection. + Building Perl as a part of the base system created a number of + difficulties which made updates problematic. + The base system utilities that used Perl have either + been rewritten (if still applicable) or discarded (if + obsolete).</para> + + <para>It is generally possible to run old + 4.<replaceable>X</replaceable> executables under + 5.<replaceable>X</replaceable>, but this requires the + <filename>compat4x</filename> distribution to be installed. + Thus, using old ports <emphasis>may</emphasis> be + possible.</para> + + <para>When installing or upgrading over the top of an existing + 4-STABLE-based system, it is extremely important to clear out + old header files in <filename>/usr/include</filename>. + Renaming or moving this directory before a binary installation + or an <literal>installworld</literal> is generally + sufficient. If this step is not taken, confusion may result + (especially with C++ programs) as the compiler may wind up + using a mixture of obsolete and current header files.</para> + + </section> + + </section> + + <section> + + <title>Summary</title> + + <para>While FreeBSD 5.0 contains a number of new and exciting + features, it may not be suitable for all users at this time. In + this document, we presented some background on release + engineering, some of the more notable new features of the 5.0 + series, and some drawbacks to early adoption. We also presented + some future plans for the 4-STABLE development branch and some + tips on upgrading for early adopters.</para> + + </section> +</article> |
