The Blender Foundation has announced that it will now release an annual Long Term Support (shortened to LTS) version. This release will be supported for two years with important bug fixes and updates for new hardware, while strictly maintaining compatibility with aim to support larger studios with long-term projects and corporations with stricter installation procedures. Read the announcement in full on Blender’s website.
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double post, sorry, feel free to delete
Two years is not very long for something called “LTS”
It’s the same time that other companies use as a long term such as unity
It is ridiculous amount of time. In comparison, AD often drops support for software as soon as next version releases, which happens yearly. It’s similar with other software as well. LTS is not meant for you to hunker down on one version for a decade. It’s meant for you to use it until you finish a project.
Since Blender development is now very fast, with major release ever 4 months, it’s not uncommon for 2 or even 3 releases to pass by before you finish a larger project.
2 years on the other hand is plety of time. If you start a project on LTS version, and that project is so big it takes over 2 years, and on top of that you will explicitly not want to switch/upgrade versions during the project then you will still have super stable version to finish the project on, given that it has received 2 years worth of bugfixes.
You’ve probably misunderstood what it is. It’s not about incentive for people to use outdated versions as long as possible. It’s about giving people who work on lengthy projects specific solid versions to rely on throughout.
It is a very important development.
I think it is also important to make addon developers to choose same version to support.
Instead i don’t like at all the new supposed naming version. I’ll let as it is.
Autodesk supports the current release, plus 3 versions back on all its software. For tech support, it’s the same, although if someone contacts us with a Max issue, I’ll support them as best I can regardless of the version they’re using. (I had a customer ask me once if I could offer tips on how to optimize a Windows NT machine made with 10+ year-old components to run his copy of 3ds Max Release 3… which came out in 1999! And yep, I called him directly and did my best to help him.) 🙂
Does Autodesk deliver daily builds with user patches?
Supporting 3 versions back means giving a 4 year support, but the problem is Autodesk does not only support, but also only ALLOWS to use 3 year old versions, so if a production is being done with a 5 year old version they are forced to renew to the latest version, otherwise they would be using an illegal version of the software, no matter what rental license they have.
I know a company or two that have never recieved a custom build or a high priority patch, I assume some big ones have, not the medium/big ones or outside of the golden circle, in fact there are some bugs that are quite old and you can find a lot of people with a similar situation.
Will this user be able to continue using his 3ds Max Release 3 license if some components like the GPU, CPU or Hard drives ar renewed?
Or any other user with a PERPETUAL license be able to install and activate their PERPETUAL license after Autodesk decides to stop activating PERPETUAL licenses?
For example a 2015 license holder, I know some, will they be able to upgrade their computers and keep using their PERPETUAL license, purchased and paid in full to Autodesk?
Autodesk don’t give support for 3 versions back, Autodesk FORCES you to work with 3 versions back as a maximum if you are under rental.
I really don’t understand how can you be proud of Autodesk right now, what Autodesk is doing is plainly bad, unethical and it may even be illegal, time will tell.
They basically took the same concept behind LTS for Ubuntu Linux, should be enough, and at the same time it will give more freedom for modifications and more radical changes in the intermediate versions.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LTS
For example, we give support and development to studios implementing Blender, is something new we are starting now, and for them having the LTS is very very welcome, all developments we are going to do for those studios will be for 2.83, the first LTS version, and we will have to update them in two years, very good for them, very good for us because we have a stable platform for the developments.
Did you actually read the page you linked to?
“A new LTS version is released every two years. In previous releases, a Long Term Support (LTS) version had three years support on Ubuntu (Desktop) and five years on Ubuntu Server. Starting with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, both versions received five years support”
Yep, I refer to this:
This is what they took as reference, the duration of the LTS support won’t be five years thought 🙂