PTP/policy/retention

Integration builds against HEAD are provided on a weekly basis and available from download.eclipse.org. Integration builds are deleted once a release versions of the corresponding stream becomes available. Release versions are listed on the download page. Versions older than one year are archived on a regular basis and download URLs may change from download.eclipse.org to archive.eclip

CVS

Any code that was included in a release is left in CVS forever. All files are tagged during a build. Build tags are are date/time stamp for the build and will match the download page and zip file names. In addition, releases will be tagged using tag of the form "R3_0_2". The releng map files should be used to determine exactly which features and plugins are included in a particular release.

ZIP File Distributions

Formal releases are kept forever, but only the most recent release is kept on the main download page. Other, older distributions can be found on the archive site.

While developing a new releases, milestone builds are kept until the release, at which point they are deleted.

Similarly, while developing a milestone, weekly integration builds are kept until the milestone is available, and then they are deleted.

[edit] Features in update site repository Changed beginning with 3.1.1 and 3.1.2. Only the most recent release (and/or patches) are kept on the update site. The goal is to allow users to update to the latest code from what they have installed, but we don't support updating to some previous release. For example, if we come out with a "3.0.3", the "3.0.2" version won't be on the update site any longer. So, someone with "3.0.0" installed could update to "3.0.3", but they could no longer update only to "3.0.2", once 3.0.3 was released.

The update site repository will be treated as a persistent repository of content. (From WTP 3.1.1, onward.) Once something is installable from a release repository URL, it will always be installable from that repository URL. This policy technically, currently applies to only WTP, since Eclipse Foundation as a whole currently does not have an Eclipse-wide policy, but its expected our prerequisite projects will do similar (and beginning with Galileo SR1, all Simultaneous Release projects will be persisted, even if the Project does not manage it themselves). Note that the efficiency of installing old releases may not be maintained. That is, they would be expected to be slower, as eventually old artifacts will be moved to the eclipse archives, and no longer mirrored. Also, the "categories" that display the features in Eclipse 'Install New Software' dialog will change over time, but the underlying features and bundles will be there, even if not displayed in a category.

[edit] Zip files for patches or update sites The patch builds are not retained.

Granted, some of them have been around a long time, but there is no guarantee or predicable time line. The builds are created at the request of committers, usually for some specific adopter problem, and generally not for general use. They are use-at-your-own risk, if someone does want to use it, since hasn't been through the usual review and test cycle.

There are some cases, when updates are created in the form of feature patches and put on the public update site. These require PMC review/approval since could effect general users and all adopters. These patches on the update site will follow the update site repository policy.