Hi,
Henrik Brix Andersen wrote:
On Thu, 2004-02-05 at 13:27, Sven Neumann wrote:[...] nail us down [...]
[snip]
Imposing a fixed release schedule [...]
[snip]
[...] this road map should not be set in stone.
I think both you and Sven have somewhat missed the point. The funny thing is, we are *almost* in agreement.
I'm not trying to nail anyone down. I don't think anyone is. I'm not *imposing* anything. The roadmap (as has been shown by the last one) is *not* set in stone.
However, it is precise. I don't think this should be a stick we use to beat ourselves with. I don't think we should get upset if a release isn't done *exactly* on the 31st of March or whatever. But I think that we're more likely to be close to the bigger dates if we have smaller, closer dates to aim for. I also think that we should release regularly, regardless of whether we think things are "ready" or "finished", because it's healthy for the project.
Releasing should not be a big deal. It could be as simple as doing
cvs tag GIMP_2_1_1
cvs diff -r GIMP_2_1_0 -r GIMP_2_1_1 > the_diff
In which case, there'd be no reason not to do it often. Currently, we impose a standard somewhat stricter on ourselves, which means that making a release takes a long time (it can take 7 or 8 hours on a fast machine). But who cares if that thing you wanted to fix didn't get done? It'll be done for the next release. A release is *not* a deadline, it's a liberation of the work of the last 2 weeks.
It's no secret that the GIMP project is rather short on active developers these days (I haven't been very active myself lately either) - and I think setting a tight release plan/road map will only discourage new developers to start spending what little spare time they may have contributing to The GIMP.
Well, myself and Sven are in agreement on the tight release plan, more or less. I think it might be a little too tight, and I personally would have aimed for a first pre-release for guadec, with a final 2.2 in August, but I think a 4 month release is possible. The *only* difference between my idea and yours and Sven's is that I think that giving concrete dates as rough guidelines for milestones is better than having bigger milestones every 6 weeks to 2 months.
I respect that you don't want to have to stick to dates. Like I said, there will be no Stazi knocking on your door if you don't. The roadmap is meant to be specific, but flexible, in my mind. If the majority opinion is against that, I will re-do a vaguer roadmap with no precise dates.
Cheers, Dave.
-- Dave Neary bolsh@xxxxxxxx
