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Attn. Linux Maintainers: Tagging and releases

Posted: 2016-02-01, 23:36
by Moonchild
For all people who maintain repository build packages and copies of Pale Moon (or FossaMail, or anything else we publish) for different flavors of Linux (and other related distribution methods):

Please understand that a tag appearing on GitHub does not necessarily mean it is a final release. Tags may still be moved, removed, recreated, etc.
Although a tagged commit often means it's final, it doesn't necessarily have to be.

I understand people being excited and eager to jump on the latest new release of Pale Moon and it's wonderful to see such enthusiasm in the community! But please keep in mind:
  • Tags do not mean releases unless they are actually published on the website. GitHub may list tags as releases but that's a little presumptuous. They are just tagged commits, nothing more.
  • Our developers and maintainers are spread out around the globe - we use tags to indicate desired commits to build from.
  • Build points as indicated are for final acceptance testing and this will be public because our repository is public and we do not have a closed organizational structure that could privately tag these points.
  • If critical flaws come to light in acceptance testing, the builds are not published even if tagged, and may have the tag moved to a later/different commit.
    If you assume a tag means a published version, then you may be jumping the gun and ending up with an unintended or unstable build for your platform.
  • We also want to avoid having some platforms with releases before they are officially published on the main website - this causes confusion about the validity of your builds among users, and prevents necessary information being available to users like release notes that are often essential.
So please have a little patience and curb that enthusiasm until releases are final :)

Thanks for your attention!