From: Josh Grosse (jggimicomcast.net)
Date: Mon May 02 2005 - 07:14:03 CDT

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 The "flavors" of OpenBSD can be confusing. Don't think of snapshots as
beta releases. They're not. They're not even a "flavor" of OpenBSD.

Think of them, instead, as a point-in-time alpha release that was made
for a particular test of a some kernel/userland/XF4 functionality. They
are also used as a springboard to installing -current for the first time,
because you can avoid manually making all of the structural changes
described in http://openbsd.org/faq/current.html -- the "following
current" document.

It seems to me that because snapshots are packaged in a set of .tgz files
like -releases, people think of them as beta releases. But they're not.
OpenBSD doesn't have beta releases. Following -current has its uses, and
can be attractive because of port developments. But -current changes
constantly, and a snapshot is a convenient springboard only.

This is how I think of it:

  -release: production release with integrated ports
  -stable: published patches to production release
  snapshot: alpha for a particular purpose / ease-of-use springboard
  to -current install
  -current: ever changing development environment

From my perspective, none of those is a beta release.

Chapter 5 of the FAQ begins with a flavor diagram. Snapshot isn't in
the diagram. And, the rest of section 5.1 describes, in detail, what
following -current means, what snapshots are and why snapshots are
created, and how to use them. http://openbsd.org/faq/faq5.html#Flavors

I hope this was helpful as a level set.

    -Josh Grosse-

On Saturday, linc wrote:

Howdy,

I am running the April 10 snapshot, and it looks like the snapshots were updated April 27. I can't install packages now.

This is the first time I've run a snapshot. So do I have to:

1)cvs source and rebuild everything, then use pkgsrc
2)install the new snapshot and be able to install new packages (will old packages work)
3)somehow just update some of my packages to meet dependencies for the newest packages

I'm sure this is asked several times a year, haven't found it yet, sorry.

Linc

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