All,

The long anticipated and much feared 6.0 code freeze is about to begin!
I'll cut to the chase:

June 10 - Feature freeze + code slush
^^^^^^^

July 10 - RELENG_6 branch
August 1 - RELENG_6_0 branch
August 15 - 6.0-RELEASE

From June 10 until the release, the number one priority is fixing bugs.
All of the dates after June 10 are somewhat fluid and subject to change
depending on where we are with stability. We won't release 6.0 until
it is ready, but I'm pretty confident that we'll have it ready by
August.

Since SMPVFS is on by default on i386 and amd64, we need as much testing
and bug fixing there as is possible. Jeff has been doing a fantastic
job on this, but I'm sure that more help would be appreciated. Also,
now is the time to start tracking down whatever strange panics or poor
performance anyone might be seeing; the system is pretty stable at the
80% level, but there are a lot of edge cases that we need to work on
to make it a good release. A stroll through the mailing lists and PR
database would be a good place to start for anyone that wants to help.

Again, the plan is for 6.0 to be a modest replacement for 5.x. We do
plan on a 5.5 release in September to tie up the branch and help people
move to 6.0/6.1, but 6.x is truly just a much improved 5.x at this
point. For those with bosses who are fainting at the thought of there
being a 7-CURRENT around the corner and 5-STABLE coming to a close,
please keep in mind that migrating from 5.x to 6.x is trivial and is
worthwhile. However, we need to do the branch now so that we can keep
things like SMPVFS under control and produce a high-quality series of
releases with it. For those who have already adopted 5.x and cannot
spend the time/money to migrate again, RELENG_5 will still have secteam
support into at least 2007 (going by their normal formula), and I expect
there to be normal feature and bug-fix commits to it for at least
another year from now.

To jump-start the testing, I've posted a new set of 6.0-CURRENT
snapshots to ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/Jun_2005.
Once the freeze starts, I expect a new snapshot to be posted every 1-2
weeks until we get close to the release. So, please help test, report,
and fix bugs!

Thanks,

Scott