I'm currently running the 10.3-RELEASE so I will need to upgrade within the next 6 months. Naturally, I wish to minimise the number of such upgrades without losing timely security support. I am therefore struggling to understand the information at https://www.freebsd.org/security/security.html to see how best to achieve a supported stable system for as long as possible.
I'm struggling because the information seems confusing. On one hand there is the -STABLE branch which is supported until 2021, and then there are the -RELEASEs which are supported for three months after the next minor point release. The table implies it would be better to install a -STABLE release rather than one of the point releases, but then lists the build as "n/a" which could mean either "not applicable" or "not available". Is the -STABLE branch just a concept, embracing all the -RELEASEs with that major number, or is it something I can install that will be maintained for the next 3-4 years? There is mention a few paragraphs above the table of the strings returned, I presume, by
The published information is not at all easy to understand in terms of what one should install for production use to gain the longest stable supported system or know the best time to make a major version upgrade. Perhaps the answer to this should be a sticky so others can find it easily, as I suspect it must have been asked and answered many times on the forum in the past, but now be difficult to find unless one knows the exact keywords to bring it up in a sufficiently short list to be identified.
I'm struggling because the information seems confusing. On one hand there is the -STABLE branch which is supported until 2021, and then there are the -RELEASEs which are supported for three months after the next minor point release. The table implies it would be better to install a -STABLE release rather than one of the point releases, but then lists the build as "n/a" which could mean either "not applicable" or "not available". Is the -STABLE branch just a concept, embracing all the -RELEASEs with that major number, or is it something I can install that will be maintained for the next 3-4 years? There is mention a few paragraphs above the table of the strings returned, I presume, by
uname -r
which implies there is a -STABLE version which can be installed, but I saw another thread on this forum in which someone had asked how they could upgrade their 11.1-STABLE with freebsd-upgrade
and was told it only works with releng releases.The published information is not at all easy to understand in terms of what one should install for production use to gain the longest stable supported system or know the best time to make a major version upgrade. Perhaps the answer to this should be a sticky so others can find it easily, as I suspect it must have been asked and answered many times on the forum in the past, but now be difficult to find unless one knows the exact keywords to bring it up in a sufficiently short list to be identified.