Good news, at least for some, packman continues.

https://lists.links2linux.de/pipermail/packman/2026-October/018393.html

Here's the quote:

Dear all,

first of all: thank you for the many replies, questions and offers. We
were genuinely happy about them – and we are aware that we did not
follow up on all of them. That was not a lack of appreciation, it was
simply down to the situation. Please don't hold it against us.

And yes: Flatpak was an example. One of several, and in hindsight
probably not the best-chosen one – we should have left it out and stuck
with "distributions have evolved". We did not expect it to spark a
full-blown debate about the end of packaging.

All the better, then, the actual news: some long-term contributors have
stepped up to take over Packman. The service will continue as before,
and the discontinuation planned for 31/12/2026 is off the table. We will
sort out the details of the handover (infrastructure, builds,
repositories) in the background and get back to you here once there is
something concrete to report.

Best regards,
Marc SchiffbauerDear all,

first of all: thank you for the many replies, questions and offers. We
were genuinely happy about them – and we are aware that we did not
follow up on all of them. That was not a lack of appreciation, it was
simply down to the situation. Please don't hold it against us.

And yes: Flatpak was an example. One of several, and in hindsight
probably not the best-chosen one – we should have left it out and stuck
with "distributions have evolved". We did not expect it to spark a
full-blown debate about the end of packaging.

All the better, then, the actual news: some long-term contributors have
stepped up to take over Packman. The service will continue as before,
and the discontinuation planned for 31/12/2026 is off the table. We will
sort out the details of the handover (infrastructure, builds,
repositories) in the background and get back to you here once there is
something concrete to report.

Best regards,
Marc Schiffbauer

Hi everyone, i just want to share my experience, ive been a linux user for almost a year, ive tried a lot of distros, i used to mainly drive Arch Linux because is rolling release, but now that i learned how to properly use and manage OpenSUSE tumbleweed im very cofortable on this system, i installed and use the vanilla kernel because i like it pure, and manually install official NVIDIA drivers using OpenSUSE guide.
This distro is gold and is sad that not many people knows it.

I’m asking because I genuinely don’t understand could you explain this in a way that makes it clear to me?

While Slowroll appears ready for daily use, it is clear that it is not yet as trouble-free as Tumbleweed.

As far as I know, the difference with Slowroll is that it receives packages only after they have successfully passed through Tumbleweed without issues. In other words, the distinction is simply that it gets the packages a bit later. If the packages have already been verified as successful and the set of packages is identical, why is it still considered to be in an experimental phase?

Furthermore, based on what I see on this page, it really doesn’t seem to be fully ready yet.

Slowroll
https://openqa.opensuse.org/group_overview/131?limit_builds=50

Tumbleweed
https://openqa.opensuse.org/group_overview/1?limit_builds=50