Re: [PATCH] [WORG] Maintenance: on the frequency of bugfix releases

[Ihor Radchenko]

Matt <matt@excalamus.com> writes:

> Not part of the patch, but part of the context: "you shoud *NOT*" -> "you 
> should *NOT*" (missing the 'l')  Already fixed and pushed 
> (https://git.sr.ht/~bzg/worg/commit/a11b256086d567d0894d337b548ec13049a8731b)

Thanks!

> Regarding the patch, it seems reasonable.  
>
> Potentially stupid question, asked without knowing precisely what's involved 
> with a bugfix release (it seems like a matter of tagging and 
> pushing?)...what's the problem with making a new release for every fix?  
> Frequency of fixes?  Time required to make the release?  Storage?

While most of the commits on bugfix are safe to include into release
(see https://orgmode.org/worg/org-maintenance.html#branches),
sometimes we do introduce new bugs on bugfix. As a recent example, see
the fixup! commit on
https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/emacs/org-mode.git/log/?h=bugfix where
I had to fix an accidental breakage on older Emacs versions that I
introduced in the previous fix.

Doing the releases too frequently will increase a chance of such bugs
crawling into ELPA releases. So, there should be at least a minimal
waiting period to get a chance to handle such problems.

Sometimes, we also need to fix critical bugs - these may be tricky and
require some more testing before exposing to wide public.

That's why there should be some not-too-long and not-too-short interval
between bugfix releases.

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
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