Hi everyone,
I'm contemplating a change to how we handle the Go releases in Fedora and would like community feedback before moving forward with a formal proposal.
Currently, each Fedora release ships with a different Go version. For example, right now:
- Fedora 41: Go 1.23 (upgraded to 1.24, see point 1 in the next list)
- Fedora 42: Go 1.24
- Fedora 43: Go 1.25
This creates several problems:
- Both Go and Fedora releases happen every six months, but they are a little off; almost end-of-life Fedora releases will have end-of-life Go versions for around 2 months. To avoid this scenario, we have to ask for an exception to upgrade Go in those versions.
- Package maintainers must support multiple Go versions simultaneously across different Fedora releases, increasing testing complexity and bug surface area. Go is superb at maintaining retrocompatibility, but upstream projects tend to enforce the latest Go version for different reasons.
- Go developers tend to use the latest version available as soon as possible, but this latest version is only available in the latest Fedora stable release. This has been solved with a COPR repository, but discoverability might be a problem (it's always easier to find packages from the repositories).
These issues are not huge concerns, but there is always margin for improvement.
The idea I'm considering: maintain identical Go versions across all active Fedora releases. Ideally, starting with the next Fedora release, every new stable release will have the latest Go version. For example, by the time of Fedora 45; Fedora Rawhide, Fedora 45, and Fedora 44 would have 1.27. I would rather not apply this to the current stable releases to avoid unnecessary mass rebuilds and issues.
Previously, and similar to the COPR repository I mentioned, I considered the option of adding a new package named golang-latest that ships the latest stable version of Go in all the branches, leaving untouched the current release workflow. However, this approach also has its issues, mainly duplication of the specfile and keeping both packages up to date. But it is still an option in case the community doesn't like my idea.
This idea differs from typical Fedora practices. However, I think it is viable and will bring several benefits:
- All users get security fixes as soon as possible.
- Reduced maintenance overhead (hopefully).
- Consistent development experience across Fedora versions.
- Better alignment with Go's rapid upstream development.
Thanks!
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