Release schedules

[Glen Barber]

On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 2:13 PM, Maxim Khitrov <mkhitrov at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> This discussion has come up countless number of times and the answer
> is always the same - all of us would rather wait for quality, but we'd
> also like some very rough timeline estimates that don't fall back into
> the past. Notice that I said nothing about them having to be 100%
> accurate. The questions are about the published timelines, the answers
> are about the process. Hence, nothing ever gets resolved. It makes no
> sense at all to have a published timeline, but claim that it is
> irrelevant because "it's done when it's done." Do you not agree?
>

I agree to a point.  I wouldn't push something out if it was less than
what could/should be expected.  I haven't been a FreeBSD user long
enough to remember the (previously quoted) "5.0 debacle", but I'm sure
if I waited for a new release only to be disappointed, who knows what
OS I may have went with.

Yes, keeping users informed on the status of releases is nice --
that's what we have the ML for.

> For example, RC2 builds were scheduled for 29 September 2008. When
> that day comes (or same week perhaps), whoever has the ability to
> change the release schedule page should update it regardless of what
> happened. If RC2 builds started, that should be reflected in the
> 'actual' column. Otherwise, if it's a minor change in the timeline,
> put the new expected date in. As is the case of 7.1 release, if the
> person honestly has no idea when RC2 will happen, put in 'December',
> 'January', 'Second half of January'... 'Sometime next year' if it's
> that uncertain. Anything at all; it takes 5 minutes to do. In the
> worst case, your estimate will need to be updated again in a month or
> two. In the best case, the release will be made before the expected
> date. I, for one, promise not to complain about that. :)
>

If the sacrifice is an out-of-date column in a webpage while bugs are
being worked out, in my opinion, that's fine with me.  (IMHO)


-- 
Glen Barber