[Qgis-psc] Formal request to extend LTR life span to two years

[Andreas Neumann]

Hi PSC,

My current employer, Kanton of Solothurn, gave me the task to submit a
formal request to PSC for the extension of the life span of the LTR version
from one year to two years.

Hence I am submitting this request now and would like to open the
discussion (again). I know we had this discussion before and it was
rejected due to limited resources.

A little bit of background: Kanton of Solothurn was one of the first
customers of Sourcepole and back then, way before there was an LTR version,
was one of the reasons why QGIS enterprise was introduced, because QGIS did
not offer and LTR version back then and Kanton Solothurn needed longer life
spans of QGIS versions and more stability and long-term support. Meanwhile,
and mainly because QGIS now has an LTR version, Kanton Solothurn migrated
back to QGIS 3.4 on the Desktop, with the plan to introduce QGIS 3.10
plus/minus around summer 2020. The other reason why we moved back from QGIS
Enterprise to QGIS community version, was the fact that QGIS enterprise
wasn't able to catch up feature wise (of course) but also bug fix wise with
the main QGIS version. Again, the decision of QGIS.ORG to regularly run
funded bug-fix efforts with each QGIS release, re-introduced a lot of
confidence towards returning to the QGIS main community version.

The reality is, that by the time we introduce a new LTR version, half of
the life-span of said version is already gone, which leaves us with half a
year of support when we change to a new LT version.

Now, I'd like to find out under which circumstances QGIS.ORG would be
willing to officially support QGIS LTR version for 2 years. I know that the
last time I brought up this topic, it was rejected with the argument of
limited resources of QGIS.ORG. But what if QGIS.ORG would have more
resources? Would you still reject that request?

Follow up question: if QGIS.ORG would support an extension of the life span
of an LTR for 2 years, would QGIS have to maintain overlapping LT versions
in parallel, because we release a new LTR version every year, or would we
rather also release fewer LTR versions, e.g. an LTR only every second year?

Thank you - again - for discussing this issue with us.

Andreas

--
Andreas Neumann
QGIS.ORG board member (treasurer)
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