Canonical has made a change to the preparation process for intermediate LTS releases of Ubuntu (e.g., 20.04.1, 20.04.2, 20.04.3, etc.), aimed at improving the quality of releases at the expense of strict deadlines. Previously, intermediate releases were generated strictly according to the planned schedule, but now the priority will be given to the quality and completeness of testing all fixes. These changes have been made considering the experience of several past issues where last-minute fixes led to regressions or incomplete problem resolutions due to insufficient verification time.
Starting with the August update of Ubuntu 20.04.3, any fixes categorized as release-blocking that are made within a week leading up to the planned release will delay the release timing, allowing for thorough testing and verification of the fix instead of rushing to promote it. In other words, if a bug is found in builds that are release candidates, the release will now be delayed until all verification of the fix is completed. To facilitate early identification of release-blocking issues, the freeze time for daily builds has also been extended from one week to two weeks before the release, meaning an additional week for testing the frozen daily build before the first release candidate is published.
It has also been announced that the package base of Ubuntu 21.04 will undergo a Feature Freeze, shifting the focus to final refinement of already integrated features, bug identification, and resolution. The release of Ubuntu 21.04 is scheduled for April 22.
Source: opennet.ru
