The initial freeze for the upcoming Debian 13 (Trixie) release has begun, with transition requests ceasing as of March 15th. Individuals responsible for toolchain-related packages are requested to refrain from uploading without obtaining prior approval. Significant or disruptive modifications to unstable should be submitted to experimental.
The freeze comprises three key milestones: 2025-04-15 - Soft Freeze, 2025-05-15 - Hard Freeze, and TBA - Full Freeze. The list of Release Critical bugs for Trixie is showing improvement; however, the goal should be to eliminate them entirely. Participation in bug squashing sessions is highly recommended, and the preparation of release notes is also encouraged.
Bits from the Release Team: trixie freeze started
We're pleased to announce that the freeze for Debian 13 'trixie' has begun. On March 15th we stopped accepting transition requests and we are working to complete the transitions in progress. We ask the maintainers of packages that are part of the toolchain to stop uploading those packages [1] without prior approval from us. We remind everybody to stop uploading large or disruptive changes to unstable, from here on experimental is the place to do that.
Further details of the freeze are available in the freeze policy [2].
The freeze contains 3 more milestones:
* 2025-04-15 - Milestone 2 - Soft Freeze
no new packages, delayed migration
* 2025-05-15 - Milestone 3 - Hard Freeze - key packages and packages
without autopkgtests need a manual unblock for migration
* TBA - Milestone 4 - Full Freeze
all packages need a manual unblock for migration
=== RC bugs ===
The current list of Release Critical bugs for trixie [3] is progressively looking better. Thanks toeverybody who is helping out. That said, we're not there yet, ideally the number of RC bugs goes down to zero. And autoremoval has done it's job, there's a large set of packages that are currently *not* in trixie, so this is your last chance to bring them back.
Don't forget to organize your bug squashing parties:
https://wiki.debian.org/BSP/ There's one planned for the end of April.
=== release notes ===
We like to draw your attention to the release notes. We have hardly received any proposals (or even ideas), don't forget to file things worth mentioning against the release-notes pseudo package in the bts or prepare your MR on salsa [4]. The release notes editors will be helping you to shape the text, so don't be shy and submit those rough ideas already.
=== testing upgrades ===
If you are in the position to already upgrade some hosts from bookworm to trixie, we like to hear from you if you run into issues. If you don't know which package is to blame, please don't be shy and report it against the upgrade-reports pseudo package and people following that package will try and help find the right package (help wanted for the triaging).
=== your packages ===
Please take this opportunity to check packages are in their final shape and stay vigilant for release-critical bugs.
On behalf of the Release Team,
Paul
[1] https://release.debian.org/testing/essential-and-build-essential.txt
[2] https://release.debian.org/testing/freeze_policy.html
[3] https://udd.debian.org/bugs.cgi
[4] https://salsa.debian.org/ddp-team/release-notes/
