In article <19970716123143.10176.qmail@mail.ocs.com.au> you write:
>[...]
>With big and fundamental changes, it is unrealistic to expect every
>section of kernel code to compile and run. It is better to release a
>working *subset* of the kernel so the maintainers can see what major
>changes have been done and upgrade their code. The alternative is a
>restricted set of developers who get private patches and nobody else
>can participate until the patch set is released. If that is what you
>want, try the BSD world.
Note that in "the BSD world" (there are three [living] free BSD
projects), there are more than one person who can commit changes
to the source tree. And those changes are accessible from outside
(at least in FreeBSD and OpenBSD). Even with comments -- via a CVS
interface. At least in OpenBSD, there are no closed "developers
mailing lists" (i.e. like in the Linux case). [And I don't think there
are any in the other two BSD projects, either.]
And -- same as in Linux -- there is nothing hindering anyone in posting
patches not committed to the official repositories to mailing lists
or newsgroups.
So the above is not a real free BSD vs Linux case.
One major difference is that the "current" branches (comparable to the
development Linux kernels) do gradually evolve -- there aren't special
distinguished numbered releases. [Ok, sometimes, "snapshots" are taken,
but they are not special in any kind, but only another form of
distribution of the state of "current", which is accessible anyway,
via CVSup or CTM or AnonCVS, depending on the specific project]
Regards, Felix.