We reported back in January that Gentoo Linux 1.4_rc3 was due to be released on January 14th, based on the timeline laid out by the newly-adopted Formal Release Process. Obviously, this release has yet to make it out the door and users and developers alike have increasingly complained about the recurring delays, stale Portage tree and general confusion that seems to surround the release process. Fortunately, with the recent appointment of Brad Cowen as the Gentoo Release Coordinator, the 1.4 release process seems to have regained some of its lost momentum. Brad recently updated the Gentoo developer team regarding the status of the next release candidate, 1.4_rc3:

"I just wanted to take a moment and let everyone know where we stand as far as a release goes. Plans are to release an official RC3 on Thursday the 27th. This rc will include stages from the sparc, x86, and ppc teams. The x86 port will be a limited release meaning a single "one size fits all" compiled set of stages and no GRP will be packaged."

Brad went on to say that, after the rc3 release, he plans to adhere closely to the formal release process. This also means that, post rc3, the Portage tree will be unfrozen for a period of 2 weeks or so where developers will be able to migrate masked packages over to an unmasked state.