This is a draft working document that is still to be approved by the TSC and adopted by the community.

LTS is an abbreviation for “Long Term Support”.

STS is an abbreviation for “Short Term Support”.

EdgeX Foundry plans to produce and release a new named version (like Delhi, Edinburgh, Fuji, etc.) of EdgeX every six (6) months.  Named versions will also have a version number in the form of X.Y (example 1.0 or 2.1).  Depending on the features and compatibility with the prior release, the named release may be a major or minor release (see releases, versions and patches), but the semi-annual release schedule gives you, our user community, assurance that new EdgeX features and capability are delivered at least every six months.

EdgeX Foundry offers a new long-term support (LTS) release every two (2) years.  The TSC will select the release (major, minor, etc.) for the LTS release.  The code of an LTS release will be branched and maintained independently of the EdgeX master code branch. 

No new functionality will be added to an LTS release.  Only significant security and bug fixes will be added to the LTS.  LTS bug fixes (and any new LTS release or patch) must be approved by the EdgeX TSC.  An LTS release is meant to be a stable release for which organizations typically base products and for which the EdgeX community offers “support” as defined below.

The user community is encouraged to use the latest LTS release of the platform.  The EdgeX Foundry community makes announcements on its website about upcoming release end of life LTS events.  Users are encouraged to watch the EdgeX Foundry web site for support notifications. 

Support is defined as:

• Community members best effort and development priority to fix a security or system bug or major flaw (as determined by the project’s TSC) as soon as possible.
• Availability of the source code, test code and artifacts, and program artifacts such as micro service executables, shared libraries, container images (Docker or Snaps), etc. through the support period that were created and made available at the time of the release.
• Availability of the platform documentation through the support period that were created to explain and operate the release and all associated artifacts that were made available at the time of the release.
• Subject to legal restrictions, make available any supporting 3^rd party component used by EdgeX as part of the release.  Examples include MongoDB, Consul, Kong, Vault, any 3^rd party library, etc.  Where possible, EdgeX will provide archived binaries of the 3^rd party components (MongoDB, Redis, Consul, Kong, Vault, etc.) used with LTS versions of EdgeX.  Where possible, EdgeX will also keep an archive snapshot of 3^rd party source code used in the creation of LTS versions of EdgeX (ex:  code in the vendor directory of Go Lang repositories).

What is the cost of this?  Can we set up an area of Nexus for archives?

• EdgeX will not offer support around 3^rd party products.  For example, EdgeX will not fix bugs or address issues directly associated to the 3^rd party code like Kong, Vault, Consul, etc.

Additional professional support (LTS or STS) may be provided by other members of the EdgeX Foundry community.  The EdgeX Foundry project and Linux Foundation can provide connections to providers as necessary.