2.1.6 The frozen distribution
When the testing distribution is mature enough, it becomes frozen,
meaning no new code is accepted anymore, just bugfixes, if necessary. Also, a
new testing tree is created in the dists directory, assigned a new
codename. The frozen distribution passes through a few months of testing, with
intermittent updates and deep freezes called "test cycles". (The
recent Woody release process did not create a symbolic link
frozen/, so frozen was not a distribution but just a
development stage of the testing distribution.)
We keep a record of bugs in the frozen distribution that can delay a package
from being released or bugs that can hold back the whole release. Once that
bug count lowers to maximum acceptable values, the frozen distribution becomes
stable, it is released, and the previous stable distribution
becomes obsolete (and moves to the archive).
