From Fedora Project Wiki
(reconcile Rawhide and Rawhide Testing, revise somewhat)
(100 intermediate revisions by 28 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
<!-- page was renamed from Rawhide
{{autolang|base=yes}}
-->
Rawhide is the name given to the current development head of Fedora. It consists of a daily snapshot of latest built version of all Fedora packages.


== Rawhide mirrors ==
Rawhide is the name given to the current development version of Fedora. It consists of a package repository called "rawhide" and contains the latest build of all Fedora packages updated on a daily basis. Nightly live, network install, ARM and Cloud image builds are also available.


Rawhide goes by the name of "development" on the mirrors. You can find a local mirror here: <BR>
Rawhide is sometimes called "development" or "master" (as it's the "master" branch in Package git repositories).  
http://mirrors.fedoraproject.org/publiclist/Fedora/development/


== Who should use Rawhide? ==
== Goals ==


No-one should use Rawhide as their main day-to-day workstation. As Rawhide is a development branch, many changes are not heavily tested (or tested at all) before being released to Rawhide, and packages in Rawhide can and do break without warning. It is even possible that bugs in Rawhide could cause data loss. However, testing Rawhide is a very valuable activity which helps to direct Fedora development and ensure the quality of stable releases is high. It's also a fun way to try out the latest software almost as soon as it comes out. If you have a spare system, or are willing to install Rawhide to spare space on an existing system and dual boot, or use a virtual machine, testing Rawhide is a great way to contribute to Fedora development.
Rawhide has the following Goals:


== Installing Rawhide ==
* To allow package maintainers to integrate the newest '''usable''' versions of their packages into Fedora.
* To allow advanced users access to the newest '''usable''' packages in a rolling manner.
* To allow incremental changes to packages that are either too minor or major to go to stable Fedora releases.
* To identify and fix issues with packages before they reach a stable release of Fedora.


Rawhide is meant to be installable, however, since it's automated, any particular Rawhide build may not be installable due to bugs of one sort or another. There are three ways to install Rawhide. Remember that using a virtual machine, you can install Rawhide using any of these methods without disturbing an existing system. See [[Testing/qemu]].
== Audience ==


=== Yum update from official release ===
Rawhide is targeted at advanced users, testers and package maintainers.


For details and information on installing a Fedora release please see the [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/ Installation Guide] for the appropriate release.
As a Rawhide consumer, you should:  


Once your system is installed, you can upgrade to the rawhide repository one of two ways. Using graphical applications:
* Be willing to update on an almost daily basis. Rawhide gets hundreds of updates a day, and applying those updates on a regular basis allows you to more easily troubleshoot issues.


# First, modify your software sources using: <code>gpk-repo</code>
* Be willing and able to troubleshoot problems. From time to time there are problems with Rawhide packages, and you will need strong troubleshooting skills and the ability to gather information for bug reports. You need a good understanding of yum and how to downgrade packages, as well as boot time troubleshooting.
#* Leave '''only''' the ''Fedora - Rawhide'' software source enabled
# Next, update your system using: <code>gpk-application</code>


Alternatively, you may upgrade using the command-line:
* Have time and desire to always be able to learn new interfaces and changes. Rawhide packages stick closely to upstream projects, so interfaces and command-line options are subject to frequent changes.


# Type: <pre># yum --disablerepo=* --enablerepo=fedora-devel update</pre>
* Frequent reboots to test new kernel versions and confirm functionality of the boot process. If you can't reboot often, consider using a stable release instead.


You may want to enable/disable repositories in /etc/yum.repos.d/ so that only the "Fedora Development" repository is enabled.  This will allow daily Rawhide updates to appear by default in desktop notifications and "yum update".
* Be willing and able to report bugs as you find them and help maintainers gather information to fix them.  


=== From a pre-release of Fedora ===
If the above doesn't match you, you may wish to instead follow the [[Releases/Branched|Branched]] release (depending on the point in the [[Releases/{{FedoraVersion||next}}/Schedule|release cycle]]) or use regular stable Fedora releases.


Get the installer from: http://fedoraproject.org/get-prerelease
== Using Rawhide ==


Test releases of Fedora are configured to update via Rawhide by default, so you can run "yum update" or wait for desktop notification of updates.
This section discusses how to use Rawhide, as a live system or permanently installed.


=== Direct Rawhide install ===
=== Not recommended for production systems ===


The same process used to install an Fedora release (via Anaconda) can often be used to install rawhide. For an overview of the process, please review the [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/ Installation Guide].
We do not recommend that you run Rawhide as your primary production operating system. Instead, we suggest you could install and run Rawhide:


# First, [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f10/en_US/sn-which-arch.html determine your system architecture].
* As a live environment only
# Next, [http://mirrors.fedoraproject.org/publiclist/Fedora/development locate a nearby mirror] where you can download install media. NOTE: Not all mirrors will carry Rawhide in all architectures.
* In a virtual machine (VM) instance
# Next, [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f10/en_US/sn-expert-download.html download] a ''Rawhide'' Fedora CD, DVD, or <code>boot.iso</code> for your architecture from a mirror - located at "development/<arch>/os/images/boot.iso". If you have a PXE server available, see "development/<arch>/os/images/pxeboot/" for netboot kernel and initrd.
* On a secondary system
# [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f10/en_US/sn-making-media.html#sn-making-disc-media Burn the downloaded image to a CD/DVD]
* On a multiboot system, alongside a stable release of Fedora or another operating system
# [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f10/en_US/sn-start-installation.html Boot from the CD/DVD]


{{admon/tip|Don't have a burner or spare media?|For tips on installing without media, checkout how to install your system using your network interface http://docs.fedoraproject.org/install-guide/f10/en_US/ap-medialess-install.html.}}
This allows you to test Rawhide without any impact to your day-to-day workflow.


Follow the on-screen instructions from Anaconda, the graphical installer.  The installation is very straightforward. You should do a HTTP/FTP install.  For the URL of your 'install tree', use "<mirrorroot>/development/<arch>/os/" where <mirrorroot> is the mirror site URL you got from [http://mirrors.fedoraproject.org/publiclist/Fedora/development/ the mirror list].
=== Nightly images ===


== Testing Rawhide ==
All nightly images are automatically generated, are not tested by QA, and even when compose succeeds, may be broken or buggy.


There are two important things all Rawhide testers should do. First, read the [https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-test-list fedora-test-list] mailing list, where Rawhide users discuss the latest changes. You'll find discussion of significant changes and warnings of severe breakages here. Reading test-list daily is key to staying on top of Rawhide. Secondly, report all the bugs you find in Rawhide to [http://bugzilla.redhat.com Bugzilla]. Remember to file bugs according to these [[BugsAndFeatureRequests|best practices]].
Rawhide live images are automatically composed each night (U.S. time) by [[Koji]]. You can find these live images via the [https://apps.fedoraproject.org/releng-dash/ Release Engineering dashboard], under ''LiveCD Builds''. Clicking on the name of an image will download the most recent successful nightly compose.


Beyond that, here is some general advice which may be of use in using Rawhide:
A network install image named {{filename|boot.iso}} is also generated for Rawhide each night, and can be found in the {{filename|pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/(arch)/os/images/}} directory on mirrors:


* Approach the test release as a valuable chance to learn more about your system. There is a good chance you will run into some bugs in subsystems or components that you are very unfamiliar with as part of the testing process. Use this an opportunity to learn more about that particular subsystem and get familiar with its documentation. Even documentation has bugs, by following up and trying to learn from the documentation you might be able to help clean up badly worded or out of date documentation as well. The more you learn, the more effective you will be in the future if you participate in the development process again. Be as proactive as you can about reading up on how things work and you will have a much more valuable experience overall.
* [http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/x86_64/os/images/boot.iso x86_64]
* When using yum, take the time to review the list of package actions before you proceed. Don't disable the review step.
* [http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/i386/os/images/boot.iso i386]
* Get familiar with the ''/var/log/rpmpkgs'' and ''/var/log/yum.log'' log files.
* Get a notebook and make notes about system configuration changes you make. Many problems can be traced to simple configuration errors, but can appear as package update bugs. When working with other testers to confirm the problem, notes as to the other changes you have made since last update/reboot can be invaluable in tracing the problem down accurately.
* Keep at least one older kernel around that you are confident works as expected.
* Reboot daily, to test to see if any of your updates have affected startup. Its much more difficult to track down a boot up problem that was caused by an old update, if you are updating daily but have not rebooted.
* Get familiar with useful grub features for troubleshooting boot up failures.
* Don't force or nodeps any package to work around dependency problems. Instead, report them as bugs or to test-list. If no-one reports these problems, they will never get fixed, and will persist into stable releases.
* Because the development tree is not guaranteed to be internally consistent every day, you will frequently see ''yum update'' fail with errors. Don't Panic. Most dependency problems will be fixed by the developers in one or two days, sometimes simply by requesting more package rebuilds. If you see a dependency problem with ''yum update'' on your system for several days in a row, and see no discussion of it on test-list, see below to decide whether and how you should report it.
* If there is one error (such as a package depending on an old library major) holding you back from a full Rawhide update, you can use ''yum update --skip-broken'' to update all other packages. However, make sure the error has been reported to the maintainer of the offending package.
* You might need to disable GPG check in /etc/yum.conf or the fedora-devel repository in /etc/yum.repos.d if packages are incorrectly signed.


=== When to Report Update Problems ===
Note that if generation of the {{filename|boot.iso}} images fails for a given day, the file will not be present on the mirrors (the last successful compose is not retained). In this case, you just have to wait for a successful compose, or use one of the other images/methods described on this page.


There is a daily build report of the development tree sent to the fedora-test-list every morning as part of the automated push of packages out to the publicly accessible trees. The daily report contains information about new, removed and updated packages. It also contains a summary of known dependency problems for each arch for which the development tree is built for. Please, if you experience any problem updating against the development tree the first thing you should review is the last two or three build reports. If you are seeing a dependency problem summarized in the latest build report, you can be sure the developers are aware of the problem. Package maintainers receive daily emails when their packages are on this list.
You can attempt to install Rawhide from these images; you are considerably more likely to encounter problems than you would with a stable release, however, as the installer itself and all its dependencies are of course in an unstable state. Follow the [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/Fedora/{{FedoraVersion}}/html/Installation_Guide/index.html normal installation procedure] to install Rawhide.


Note that the broken dependency list which is part of the daily rawhide reports only provides the first layer of dependencies and not the entire list to save build time.  Unlisted packages might also be affected, but fixed when one or more of the listed packages are rebuilt.
For PXE installations, the relevant files can be found in the {{filename|pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/(arch)/os/images/pxeboot}} directory.


If however the problem lingers longer than a few days on your system, and the problem package is not listed in the daily report, that could be an indication that you have run into a situational bug that not everyone is seeing. This is when you can spring into action as a tester and make a difference. But, before you file a new bug report there is a short recipe you can follow to avoid filing unnecessarily. Please remember that test releases exist primarily to help the developers identify problems so they can be fixed in time for release. Unfortunately, reactionary bug filing of duplicate or well known issues can take developer time away from actually fixing issues.
Nightly [[Architectures/ARM|ARM]] and Cloud disk images can be found on the [https://apps.fedoraproject.org/releng-dash/ Release Engineering dashboard], similar to the nightly live images.


# read fedora-test-list: Go back into your archives or the web archives for fedora-test-list and read over the threads in the last 48 hours and see if there has been any discussion about the specific update errors you have been seeing. Generally, these sorts of errors are seen by most everyone with similar hardware, so its a very good chance that other testers are already discussing it. Please don't just post a new post to fedora-test-list until after you have reviewed the last 48 hours worth of posts. Having multiple discussions about the same issue is a drain on the time of other testers and developers.
=== Point installer to Rawhide repositories ===
# search bugzlla.redhat.com: Search to see if there are any reports about the update issue you have seen
# drop a note into fedora-test-list: Please only start a new thread only after you attempted to find previous discussion of this problem in the test-list or in bugzilla. Other testers can help you confirm the problem, or if they can't confirm it they can help you determine if its a configuration problem or user error on your part. The test-list is a great way to assistance from other more experienced testers, but please do what you can to use the archives responsibility to avoid duplication of information and discussion.
# File a new bug report: If the exact nature of the dependency problem during updating is lingering for several days or if the problem seems specialized to your situation and it doesn't appear that the developer is aware of this problem.... file a new bug. If you are unsure how to file, experienced testers in fedora-test-list can make suggestions. Please don't assume its a yum bug. Most dependency issues are packaging bugs in one of the packages detailed in the error messages.


=== What does it mean when something "hits Rawhide"? ===
You can sometimes install Rawhide by using a stable install medium and pointing it to the Rawhide repository for packages to install.


Rawhide is automatically generated once daily from the latest packages that are built. Packages that are built one day are generally in the next days rawhide.
# Boot the most recent stable Fedora installer following the [http://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/Fedora/{{FedoraVersion}}/html/Installation_Guide/index.html normal procedure]
# Go to the ''Installation Source'' screen, click the ''On the network:'' button, set the dropdown box to ''https://'', and manually enter: ''download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/(arch)/os/'' (where (arch) is x86_64 or i386 as appropriate) as the address
# Finish the install as normal.  


(For the curious, the compose is done at Midnight US Eastern, 0400/0500 UTC.)
For this method to work, there should be no major changes in Rawhide that the installer is not ready for, such as packages it depends on being retired or other similar situations.


=== What is a rawhide "push"? ===
=== Upgrade from an existing installation ===


A rawhide push is simply the rawhide spin for that day. Occasionally, if the push is extremely broken, it may be regenerated more than once.
You may also try to install a non-Rawhide release of Fedora, and then upgrade to Rawhide. It is usually best to use the newest release available, and install all updates for the release itself before attempting to upgrade to Rawhide.


=== How can I know what is changing in Rawhide? ===
You can attempt the upgrade [[Upgrading_Fedora_using_yum#To_rawhide|with yum]] or with [[FedUp]]. To use fedup, run {{command|fedup --network rawhide --nogpgcheck --instrepo <nowiki>http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/$(uname -i)/os/</nowiki>}}.


Nightly reports are sent to fedora-test-list and fedora-devel-list, with the subject 'rawhide report: <date> changes'.
See the full procedure at [https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/QA:Testcase_upgrade_fedup_cli_previous_desktop QA:Testcase_upgrade_fedup_cli_previous_desktop].
Included in these reports are what packages have been added, removed, or updated (with short changelog snippets), along with a list of any broken dependencies.
This method may fail if there are upgrade path issues (newer packages in Stable or Branched than Rawhide), or broken dependencies. You may be able to work around the problem by removing the packages that have issues (and reinstalling them at a later date once the issues are fixed).


http://git.fedoraproject.org/ and http://hg.fedoraproject.org/ and https://fedorahosted.org/ are good places to look at
== Discussing Rawhide ==
the upstream state of many Fedora projects.
 
There are a number of ways to communicate with other Rawhide users:
 
=== IRC ===
 
Rawhide discussion is on topic and welcome in both the {{fpchat|#fedora-devel}} and {{fpchat|#fedora-qa}} IRC channels.
 
=== Mailing Lists ===
 
Rawhide discussion is on topic and welcome in both the {{fplist|test}} and {{fplist|devel}} lists.
 
=== Bugzilla ===
 
Rawhide bugs should be reported against the ''Fedora'' product, ''rawhide'' version and the affected component.  Please do follow [[BugsAndFeatureRequests|best practices]] when filing. Remember that IRC and mailing lists are useful to help narrow down if some behavior is a bug or where to report it, but are themselves not bug reporting channels. Always file bugs in [http://bugzilla.redhat.com Bugzilla].
 
Note that broken dependencies are mailed to maintainers for each daily Rawhide compose where a package has such broken dependencies. Therefore, it's usually not worth filing a bug for broken dependencies unless they don't appear in the daily report, or you have a fix or improvement to suggest.
 
=== Blogs ===
 
The following blogs are not official communication, but are useful to follow if you are running Rawhide.
 
* [http://rawhidewatch.wordpress.com/ Rawhide Watch]
* [http://www.scrye.com/wordpress/nirik/category/rawhide/ Kevin's musings / Rawhide]
 
== Producing Rawhide ==
 
Package owners must build for rawhide using koji just like you would any other build; you do not go through the bodhi process and the build becomes available almost immediately.
 
The Rawhide repository is composed every day starting at 05:15UTC. All rawhide builds in the buildsystem at that time are composed and pushed out to mirrors. Rawhide is under "development/rawhide" on the mirrors. You can find a local "development" mirror [http://mirrors.fedoraproject.org/publiclist/Fedora/development/ on the public mirror list]. Compose time varies depending on number of changes but is typically between 5 and 8 hours.
 
Composes are done in a rawhide chroot using the 'mash' tool called from a script maintained by Fedora Release engineering: http://git.fedorahosted.org/cgit/releng/tree/scripts/buildrawhide If the base set of packages in rawhide needed to compose rawhide are broken, the daily compose may fail.
 
A report for each Rawhide compose is sent to to the {{fplist|test}} and the {{fplist|devel}} lists. This report contains output from the 'repodiff' tool from the previous compose as well as a broken dependency report for packages with broken dependencies. Additionally, private email is sent to maintainers with packages containing broken dependencies.
 
Package maintainers should read and follow the [[Updates_Policy#Rawhide_.2F_devel_.2F_master|Rawhide updates policy]] for building any packages in Rawhide.
 
If needed and approved by [[Fedora_Engineering_Steering_Committee|FESCo]], Mass Rebuilds are done by release-engineering in Rawhide a month or so before the next release branches from it. Typically these are done for a global change over all packages such as a new gcc release, or rpm package format.
 
Rawhide packages are currently not signed. Work is ongoing to sign at least the majority of them.
 
== Questions and Answers ==
 
'''Q:''' Doesn't rawhide eat babies / kill pets / burn down houses / break constantly?
 
A: No. Please stop telling everyone that.
 
'''Q:''' So Rawhide is very stable and we can all use it?
 
A: No. See audience above. There are things that break from time to time, but if you are able to downgrade or troubleshoot such issues aren't too severe. Most users should still stick to stable Fedora releases, but Rawhide is a viable option for enthusiasts to experiment with.
 
'''Q:''' I'm using a Stable Fedora release, but I want a newer package version that's only available in Rawhide. Can I just yum install it?
 
A: No. Mixing releases like this is a very bad idea. Better options are:
 
* Ask the Fedora maintainer in a bug report to update the stable version if permitted by policy.
* If not, there may be a [http://copr.fedoraproject.org/ COPR] that provides the updated version. See the COPR page for more details.
* Obtain the src.rpm for the package you wish and try and rpmbuild --rebuild it (which may or may not work depending on dependencies).
 
'''Q:''' I want to run the rawhide kernel on my stable Fedora machine. Can I do that?
 
A: Sometimes yes. The kernel is more self contained than other rawhide packages and you also can easily boot your older kernel if the Rawhide kernel goes wrong. Simply download and yum install the package. However, note that Rawhide kernels often have debugging code enabled, which results in them performing noticeably worse than 'release' kernels (they will be slower and consume more memory).
 
'''Q:''' Is Rawhide a "rolling release" ?
 
A: It depends on how you define that, but yes.
 
'''Q:''' How can I tell when the Rawhide compose for the day has finished?
 
A: Check the [https://apps.fedoraproject.org/releng-dash/ dashboard!] You can also see the reports it sends to the {{fplist|test}} and the {{fplist|devel}} lists, or watch fedmsg for the messages that rawhide compose has finished.
 
'''Q:''' How do I get out of Rawhide again? I want to switch to the [[Branched]] release or a stable release.
 
A: Remove the {{package|fedora-repos-rawhide}} package and/or disable the 'rawhide' repository ({{command|su -c 'yum-config-manager --disable rawhide'}}), enable the 'fedora' and optionally 'updates' and 'updates-testing' repositories ({{command|su -c 'yum-config-manager --enable fedora(,updates,updates-testing)'}}) and perhaps run {{command|su -c 'yum --releasever<nowiki>=</nowiki>(version) distro-sync'}}. The farther the branch to which you want to switch is behind Rawhide, the more trouble you might have with this.
 
A possible problem is that you might miss the branching point, and your system has already a bunch of post-branch Rawhide packages installed. In that case, the yum distro-sync will help you to get everything back on the right track.
 
'''Q:''' As a package maintainer do I have to build rawhide packages or does the nightly compose take care of that?
 
A: No. You must build for Rawhide using koji. The nightly compose only collects packages already built and marked with the appropriate target (rawhide) in koji.
 
'''Q:''' Why aren't Rawhide packages signed?
 
A: Rawhide signing is currently on development. Check [https://fedorahosted.org/rel-eng/ticket/5870 Release Engineering ticket 5870] for status updates.
 
== Hints and Tips ==
 
* Your package management system can be of great help in diagnosing and working around issues you find. Do read up and understand:
** {{command|yum downgrade}}
** {{command|yum history}}
** {{command|yum update --skip-broken}}
** {{command|koji download-build}}
 
* You should update frequently (preferably every day). This allows you to more easily narrow down when a problem or issue appeared. If you apply a week of Rawhide updates at once you have many more packages to examine to narrow down issues.
 
* Reboot often (preferably whenever new kernels arrive). This allows you to test the boot up process and packages related to it, as well as newer kernels. Read and understand the Dracut troubleshooting steps.
 
* Follow the {{fplist|test}} and the {{fplist|devel}} lists for rawhide issues, try and at least skim them before doing your daily Rawhide updates. Look for '[rawhide]' subjects or reports of issues. Additionally if you find a problem and are not sure what to file bugs against you can open a discussion there.
 
* Rawhide kernels are often built with varying degrees of debugging code enabled, which will result in worse performance and increased resource usage. See [[KernelDebugStrategy]] for details on exactly what debugging code is enabled for which kernel builds. You can disable SLUB debugging for those builds for which it is enabled by passing "slub_debug=-" to your kernel command line in {{filename|/etc/default/grub}} (and re-generating your grub config, or just adding it directly). Additionally, you can run kernels in the [[RawhideKernelNodebug|Rawhide Kernel Nodebug]] repo that have all debugging disabled.
 
* If you are using a graphical desktop environment in your Rawhide install, you may wish to install several of them. This allows you to still login and troubleshoot when your primary desktop environment is not working for some reason.
 
* Have a rescue media handy of the current stable Fedora release for emergencies.
 
== History ==
 
Red Hat Linux "Raw Hide" announcement: [http://lwn.net/1998/0820/rawhide.html on lwn]
 
The name might come from [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rawhide_%28song%29 the song with the same name] that starts with "Rolling, rolling, rolling, ..."
 
At one time, Rawhide would freeze before release milestones. This was changed with the [[No_Frozen_Rawhide_Proposal]] and Branched process which we now follow.

Revision as of 11:26, 19 February 2015

Rawhide is the name given to the current development version of Fedora. It consists of a package repository called "rawhide" and contains the latest build of all Fedora packages updated on a daily basis. Nightly live, network install, ARM and Cloud image builds are also available.

Rawhide is sometimes called "development" or "master" (as it's the "master" branch in Package git repositories).

Goals

Rawhide has the following Goals:

  • To allow package maintainers to integrate the newest usable versions of their packages into Fedora.
  • To allow advanced users access to the newest usable packages in a rolling manner.
  • To allow incremental changes to packages that are either too minor or major to go to stable Fedora releases.
  • To identify and fix issues with packages before they reach a stable release of Fedora.

Audience

Rawhide is targeted at advanced users, testers and package maintainers.

As a Rawhide consumer, you should:

  • Be willing to update on an almost daily basis. Rawhide gets hundreds of updates a day, and applying those updates on a regular basis allows you to more easily troubleshoot issues.
  • Be willing and able to troubleshoot problems. From time to time there are problems with Rawhide packages, and you will need strong troubleshooting skills and the ability to gather information for bug reports. You need a good understanding of yum and how to downgrade packages, as well as boot time troubleshooting.
  • Have time and desire to always be able to learn new interfaces and changes. Rawhide packages stick closely to upstream projects, so interfaces and command-line options are subject to frequent changes.
  • Frequent reboots to test new kernel versions and confirm functionality of the boot process. If you can't reboot often, consider using a stable release instead.
  • Be willing and able to report bugs as you find them and help maintainers gather information to fix them.

If the above doesn't match you, you may wish to instead follow the Branched release (depending on the point in the release cycle) or use regular stable Fedora releases.

Using Rawhide

This section discusses how to use Rawhide, as a live system or permanently installed.

Not recommended for production systems

We do not recommend that you run Rawhide as your primary production operating system. Instead, we suggest you could install and run Rawhide:

  • As a live environment only
  • In a virtual machine (VM) instance
  • On a secondary system
  • On a multiboot system, alongside a stable release of Fedora or another operating system

This allows you to test Rawhide without any impact to your day-to-day workflow.

Nightly images

All nightly images are automatically generated, are not tested by QA, and even when compose succeeds, may be broken or buggy.

Rawhide live images are automatically composed each night (U.S. time) by Koji. You can find these live images via the Release Engineering dashboard, under LiveCD Builds. Clicking on the name of an image will download the most recent successful nightly compose.

A network install image named boot.iso is also generated for Rawhide each night, and can be found in the pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/(arch)/os/images/ directory on mirrors:

Note that if generation of the boot.iso images fails for a given day, the file will not be present on the mirrors (the last successful compose is not retained). In this case, you just have to wait for a successful compose, or use one of the other images/methods described on this page.

You can attempt to install Rawhide from these images; you are considerably more likely to encounter problems than you would with a stable release, however, as the installer itself and all its dependencies are of course in an unstable state. Follow the normal installation procedure to install Rawhide.

For PXE installations, the relevant files can be found in the pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/(arch)/os/images/pxeboot directory.

Nightly ARM and Cloud disk images can be found on the Release Engineering dashboard, similar to the nightly live images.

Point installer to Rawhide repositories

You can sometimes install Rawhide by using a stable install medium and pointing it to the Rawhide repository for packages to install.

  1. Boot the most recent stable Fedora installer following the normal procedure
  2. Go to the Installation Source screen, click the On the network: button, set the dropdown box to https://, and manually enter: download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/(arch)/os/ (where (arch) is x86_64 or i386 as appropriate) as the address
  3. Finish the install as normal.

For this method to work, there should be no major changes in Rawhide that the installer is not ready for, such as packages it depends on being retired or other similar situations.

Upgrade from an existing installation

You may also try to install a non-Rawhide release of Fedora, and then upgrade to Rawhide. It is usually best to use the newest release available, and install all updates for the release itself before attempting to upgrade to Rawhide.

You can attempt the upgrade with yum or with FedUp. To use fedup, run fedup --network rawhide --nogpgcheck --instrepo http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/$(uname -i)/os/.

See the full procedure at QA:Testcase_upgrade_fedup_cli_previous_desktop. This method may fail if there are upgrade path issues (newer packages in Stable or Branched than Rawhide), or broken dependencies. You may be able to work around the problem by removing the packages that have issues (and reinstalling them at a later date once the issues are fixed).

Discussing Rawhide

There are a number of ways to communicate with other Rawhide users:

IRC

Rawhide discussion is on topic and welcome in both the #fedora-devel[?] and #fedora-qa[?] IRC channels.

Mailing Lists

Rawhide discussion is on topic and welcome in both the test and devel lists.

Bugzilla

Rawhide bugs should be reported against the Fedora product, rawhide version and the affected component. Please do follow best practices when filing. Remember that IRC and mailing lists are useful to help narrow down if some behavior is a bug or where to report it, but are themselves not bug reporting channels. Always file bugs in Bugzilla.

Note that broken dependencies are mailed to maintainers for each daily Rawhide compose where a package has such broken dependencies. Therefore, it's usually not worth filing a bug for broken dependencies unless they don't appear in the daily report, or you have a fix or improvement to suggest.

Blogs

The following blogs are not official communication, but are useful to follow if you are running Rawhide.

Producing Rawhide

Package owners must build for rawhide using koji just like you would any other build; you do not go through the bodhi process and the build becomes available almost immediately.

The Rawhide repository is composed every day starting at 05:15UTC. All rawhide builds in the buildsystem at that time are composed and pushed out to mirrors. Rawhide is under "development/rawhide" on the mirrors. You can find a local "development" mirror on the public mirror list. Compose time varies depending on number of changes but is typically between 5 and 8 hours.

Composes are done in a rawhide chroot using the 'mash' tool called from a script maintained by Fedora Release engineering: http://git.fedorahosted.org/cgit/releng/tree/scripts/buildrawhide If the base set of packages in rawhide needed to compose rawhide are broken, the daily compose may fail.

A report for each Rawhide compose is sent to to the test and the devel lists. This report contains output from the 'repodiff' tool from the previous compose as well as a broken dependency report for packages with broken dependencies. Additionally, private email is sent to maintainers with packages containing broken dependencies.

Package maintainers should read and follow the Rawhide updates policy for building any packages in Rawhide.

If needed and approved by FESCo, Mass Rebuilds are done by release-engineering in Rawhide a month or so before the next release branches from it. Typically these are done for a global change over all packages such as a new gcc release, or rpm package format.

Rawhide packages are currently not signed. Work is ongoing to sign at least the majority of them.

Questions and Answers

Q: Doesn't rawhide eat babies / kill pets / burn down houses / break constantly?

A: No. Please stop telling everyone that.

Q: So Rawhide is very stable and we can all use it?

A: No. See audience above. There are things that break from time to time, but if you are able to downgrade or troubleshoot such issues aren't too severe. Most users should still stick to stable Fedora releases, but Rawhide is a viable option for enthusiasts to experiment with.

Q: I'm using a Stable Fedora release, but I want a newer package version that's only available in Rawhide. Can I just yum install it?

A: No. Mixing releases like this is a very bad idea. Better options are:

  • Ask the Fedora maintainer in a bug report to update the stable version if permitted by policy.
  • If not, there may be a COPR that provides the updated version. See the COPR page for more details.
  • Obtain the src.rpm for the package you wish and try and rpmbuild --rebuild it (which may or may not work depending on dependencies).

Q: I want to run the rawhide kernel on my stable Fedora machine. Can I do that?

A: Sometimes yes. The kernel is more self contained than other rawhide packages and you also can easily boot your older kernel if the Rawhide kernel goes wrong. Simply download and yum install the package. However, note that Rawhide kernels often have debugging code enabled, which results in them performing noticeably worse than 'release' kernels (they will be slower and consume more memory).

Q: Is Rawhide a "rolling release" ?

A: It depends on how you define that, but yes.

Q: How can I tell when the Rawhide compose for the day has finished?

A: Check the dashboard! You can also see the reports it sends to the test and the devel lists, or watch fedmsg for the messages that rawhide compose has finished.

Q: How do I get out of Rawhide again? I want to switch to the Branched release or a stable release.

A: Remove the Package-x-generic-16.pngfedora-repos-rawhide package and/or disable the 'rawhide' repository (su -c 'yum-config-manager --disable rawhide'), enable the 'fedora' and optionally 'updates' and 'updates-testing' repositories (su -c 'yum-config-manager --enable fedora(,updates,updates-testing)') and perhaps run su -c 'yum --releasever=(version) distro-sync'. The farther the branch to which you want to switch is behind Rawhide, the more trouble you might have with this.

A possible problem is that you might miss the branching point, and your system has already a bunch of post-branch Rawhide packages installed. In that case, the yum distro-sync will help you to get everything back on the right track.

Q: As a package maintainer do I have to build rawhide packages or does the nightly compose take care of that?

A: No. You must build for Rawhide using koji. The nightly compose only collects packages already built and marked with the appropriate target (rawhide) in koji.

Q: Why aren't Rawhide packages signed?

A: Rawhide signing is currently on development. Check Release Engineering ticket 5870 for status updates.

Hints and Tips

  • Your package management system can be of great help in diagnosing and working around issues you find. Do read up and understand:
    • yum downgrade
    • yum history
    • yum update --skip-broken
    • koji download-build
  • You should update frequently (preferably every day). This allows you to more easily narrow down when a problem or issue appeared. If you apply a week of Rawhide updates at once you have many more packages to examine to narrow down issues.
  • Reboot often (preferably whenever new kernels arrive). This allows you to test the boot up process and packages related to it, as well as newer kernels. Read and understand the Dracut troubleshooting steps.
  • Follow the test and the devel lists for rawhide issues, try and at least skim them before doing your daily Rawhide updates. Look for '[rawhide]' subjects or reports of issues. Additionally if you find a problem and are not sure what to file bugs against you can open a discussion there.
  • Rawhide kernels are often built with varying degrees of debugging code enabled, which will result in worse performance and increased resource usage. See KernelDebugStrategy for details on exactly what debugging code is enabled for which kernel builds. You can disable SLUB debugging for those builds for which it is enabled by passing "slub_debug=-" to your kernel command line in /etc/default/grub (and re-generating your grub config, or just adding it directly). Additionally, you can run kernels in the Rawhide Kernel Nodebug repo that have all debugging disabled.
  • If you are using a graphical desktop environment in your Rawhide install, you may wish to install several of them. This allows you to still login and troubleshoot when your primary desktop environment is not working for some reason.
  • Have a rescue media handy of the current stable Fedora release for emergencies.

History

Red Hat Linux "Raw Hide" announcement: on lwn

The name might come from the song with the same name that starts with "Rolling, rolling, rolling, ..."

At one time, Rawhide would freeze before release milestones. This was changed with the No_Frozen_Rawhide_Proposal and Branched process which we now follow.