.NET LTS

[JJong-nl]

Why is the Umbraco.Cms 15.1.1 depending on .NET 9 STS (Standard Term Support)
And not the .NET8 LTS (Long Term Support)?

[AndyButland]

We align Umbraco's LTS and STS versions with Microsoft's for .NET. So in this case, the reason is that Umbraco 15 is a STS version. Umbraco 13 was the last LTS version, which runs on .NET 8.

You can read more details about this here.

[c9mb]

Aligning to MS DotNet LTS/STS makes some sense.
What I struggle to understand however, is the need for 2 major releases per year.
Breaking changes are implemented in each major version - what benefits does doing that twice a year bring to outweigh the hassles ?
Most software projects (including DotNet) use an annual release model for major updates, and I would have thought it well suited to Umbraco, who could make major releases based on each DotNet release, and give implementing devs a bit more breathing space.

[Luuk1983]

I don't have a source for you, but from what I remember is that it provided just a little more flexibility to fix issues that have breaking changes. Looking at the track record, most breaking changes so far have been pretty minor. Umbraco 9 to 13 had very little breaking changes and in my personal experience was usually just a NuGet update. 14 ofcourse is one breaking change and 15 also has some more. But fewer major releases would probably just mean that those releases have more breaking changes.

But if you don't want to update every half year, you can stick to the LTS versions and only update every two years.