[tex-live] TeXLive has no stable source tree and resorts to DVD with binaries?

[T T]

On 14 April 2011 09:09, Kārlis Repsons <karlis.repsons at gmail.com> wrote:
> Perhaps I just make some kind of theory here plus it's true that maintenance
> of all-stable file trees is a real work... On the other hand, struggling with
> more package conflicts or incompatible changes can too take time. It just then
> might go off more quietly than what it takes to provide that inter-package
> stabilization (is what I meant with "all-stable").

That's a theory, but consider this: if most people would opt for using
"all-stable" (as you might expect if this would be the default), then
you would get less testing to detect package conflicts and they may go
undetected to the stable branch anyway.  Another point: if you don't
want to risk any breakage, don't update unless you have to and you
have "all-stable".  And yet another point: even if something breaks,
we provide an option to keep package backups (enabled by default since
this year), so you can revert to previous version in emergencies.

So now the question: will your theory improve on the current practice,
how much and at what cost (remember, we are thin on resources)?

Cheers,

Tomek