Message-Id: <200908310042.n7V0gY2U002836@delorie.com>
From: Charles Wilson <cygwin AT cwilson DOT fastmail DOT fm>
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 2009 18:47:13 -0400
Subject: [ANNOUNCEMENT] Updated: {xz/liblzma-devel/liblzma1}-4.999.9beta-1
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The xz package is the successor to lzma.  Its command-line tools
support both .lzma files and the new .xz format, and it ships with
compatibility links so you don't even need to retrain your fingers:
'lzma', 'lzcat', etc, are all still present. However, you probably
should: .xz files are already being used by some upstream source
distribution sites, including GNU FSF, and the new format includes
features (such as internal integrity checks) that the old .lzma
format lacks.

The xz package provides a new runtime library: liblzma supports
encoding as well as decoding, both .lzma and .xz streams. The older
liblzmadec library supported decoding .lzma streams only.

Notes about stability:
======================
From the package README:

    This is a beta version. The .xz file format is now stable though,
    which means that files created with the beta version will be
    uncompressible with all future XZ Utils versions too (assuming
    that there are no catastrophical bugs).

    liblzma API is pretty stable now, although minor tweaks may still
    be done if really needed. The ABI is not stable yet. The major
    soname will be bumped right before the first stable release.
    Probably it will be bumped to something like .so.5.0.0 because
    some distributions using the alpha versions already had to use
    other versions than .so.0.0.0.

For cygwin, this means that the current DLL number "1" will be
changed to "5" (or whatever major soname upstream decides on)
when xz-5.0 is released.  This gives us plenty of room (2-4) for
other DLL number changes between now and that release for any
issues that pop up.  The final 5.0 release is expected relatively
soon.  However, I wanted cygwin to begin supporting the new (now
stable) .xz file format immediately -- and "relatively soon" sounds
dangerously close to the (laughable and always wrong) "Real Soon Now". 


This is a bugfix update that corrects a possible data corruption
error in earlier releases. It is claimed that 4.999.9beta is the
last beta release before 5.0 final, and that no substantive changes
are expected in the interim; that is, this is a "release candidate".

[[ compiled using gcc-3.4.4-999 ]]

There may be additional releases of xz for the cygwin-1.5 distribution,
depending on the upstream release date of xz-5.0 and the release date
of cygwin-1.7.1. Regardless, xz-5.0-1 will probably be the last one, if
it happens at all. Most development will continue in the cygwin-1.7-specific
release series.

CHANGES (since 4.999.8beta_20090714-1)
========================
o Update to latest upstream release
o Use (new) upstream xz.1 in preference to cygwin-custom
  attempt at a man page.
o Upstream:
  - Lots of documentation updates
  - Fixes data corruption error
  - C++ compatiblity fixes
  - New lzmainfo utility
  - Fixes to helper scripts (xzdiff, xzless, etc)
  - Other miscellaneous bug fixes and build improvements
  - Distribute a changelog derived from git log.

-- 
Charles Wilson
volunteer xz maintainer for cygwin

====================================================================

To update your installation, click on the "Install Cygwin now" link
on the http://cygwin.com/ web page.  This downloads setup.exe to
your system.  Then, run setup and answer all of the questions.

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