KDE 4.3.4 in KDE:KDE4:STABLE:Desktop; soon in 11.2 online update

[Owdy]

The KDE and maintenance teams are taking the unprecedented step of a point
release update to KDE SC 4.3.4 in our 'STABLE' repository and from then as an
online update to 11.2.  Normally we don't do version updates in online
updates, preferring to backport patches to the released version.

I'll be straight with you; the impetus for doing this comes from putting 4.3.4
on an enterprise product and we don't want to maintain two 4.3 codebases, but
we're confident that this is a good thing for openSUSE users, because:

- 4.3.4 has 2 months' more upstream bugfixing in it, compared to 4.3.1.   This
includes a major Plasma performance bug fix.

- 4.3.4 is the final planned release in the KDE 4.3 series and will therefore
have the longest shelf life.  It will be easier to apply future fixes from the
KDE 4.3 branch to 4.3.4 packages than to 4.3.1 packages.

- having 4.3.4 on an enterprise product gives us additional reasons
(customers' money!) to fix bugs in it, benefitting openSUSE users too.

- We are aware that any version update has the potential to include   
  regressions, but:

  - 4.3.4 is a point release with only bugfixes and translation updates

  - we've seen a lot of use of the KDE:43 repo from 11.2 users without a lot
     more bugs

  - other distributions have already shipped 4.3.2 and are going to push point
    releases as online updates as well

We have consulted the openSUSE maintenance team, who were in favour of this
move.  The online update will take place after a period of testing 4.3.4 on
11.2 in KDE:KDE4:STABLE:Desktop.

The sole drawback to this that we're aware of is that this will be a large
online update download; we hope you will agree the benefits will be worth it.

Season's greetings!

Will

--
Will Stephenson, openSUSE Team
SUSE LINUX Products GmbH - Nürnberg - AG Nürnberg - HRB 16746 - GF: Markus Rex
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