From the 'all good things must come to an end' files:

The Debian GNU / Linux distribution has announced the eighth and final update to the Debian 3.1 Sarge release.  Time sure does fly. 
It seems like just yesterday that I was complaining about the delayed Sarge release (it was actually 2004), and wondering what impact the upstart Ubuntu distribution would have on Debian.

Sarge finally reported for duty in June of 2005, and now three years later it's coming to an end -- Well an open source end which isn't a finite end since users can still choose to update packages themselves.  Sarge was supplanted in the Debian product lineup by 'Etch' which is now celebrating 1 year since its release.

The next Debian release is codenamed 'Lenny' and it's not yet 100 percent clear when it will be released.

Release dates...that was the problem that plagued Debian back in 2004 with Sarge.  Ubuntu which is based on Debian, has been successful in part because of its predictable release schedule.  It's something that Debian developers have tried and continue to try to improve. The latest release update for Lenny notes that there are now 475 open release candidate bugs.

Can a 'pure' Free/Open Source development group put out a Linux distribution 'on-time'?
I personally think so, though I also think that it's always best to first get it right. Debian (though often delayed) tries hard to get it right, often at the expense of getting a release date entirely wrong.

As for Sarge - I will remember Sarge as the distro that turned me onto Ubuntu. For Debian I'm not sure if Ubuntu is a curse or a blessing overall though -- I suppose that's still a matter for considerable debate.