[mapguide-psc] MapGuide Release Process - proposal

[Paul Spencer]

comments inline

On 27-Oct-06, at 11:27 AM, Daniel Morissette wrote:

> Paul Spencer wrote:
>> Based on my email, I've prepared a wiki page documenting my  
>> proposal for a release process for MapGuide.  Please feel free to  
>> edit and/or provide feedback via the list.
>> Please note that it will be hard to perfect this until we actually  
>> do a release or two.
>> http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/MapGuide_Release_Process
>
> Nice document. Here are a few comments based on my experience with  
> MapServer:
>
> 1- The current document seems to suggest that functional changes  
> and new features are allowed up to the first release candidate. I'm  
> not sure this is a good idea. If you follow that logic, then new  
> features or functional changes can be added anytime during the beta  
> test period... very likley to introduce new bugs while others are  
> working hard to stabilize the software... leading to a never-ending  
> release cycle.
>
> For MapServer, we have a feature freeze date that marks the  
> beginning of the release cycle. The feature freeze is announced in  
> advance when we introduce the release plan and no new features or  
> functional changes are allowed after that date. Beta1 is usually  
> produced in the week that follows the feature freeze. This means  
> that all betas contain the same features, just with more bug fixes  
> but hopefully with no new bugs. This also allows the doc team to  
> start polishing the docs at the beginning of the release cycle and  
> we hopefully end up with docs in sync with the software at on the  
> day of the final release (which is the way it should be, right?)...  
> but more importantly, the feature freeze at the beginning of the  
> release cycle is to allow the software to really stabilize during  
> the release cycle and prevent the introduction of new bugs during  
> that period.

my intention ... which I didn't get across I guess ... was that it  
would be possible to produce a first beta without having all the  
planned features in it.  It would not be a free-for-all.  Only  
planned/approved features could be introduced, and it would require  
an additional beta cycle and potentially delay the final release, but  
it could be a useful tool if the rest of the features are ready for  
wider testing and the missing features are relatively minor or have a  
low risk of introducing bugs - for instance, missing documentation.

This could also be handled through the dev releases you mention, I  
guess.

I'd like to let the process stand as is until I hear from the others  
on the PSC.  I've already had push-back from Jason on being strict  
about not adding features after Release Candidate (but I'm pretty  
firm on that one!)

>
> 2- Under release type, should we also have a "dev release", "dev  
> snapshot" or something along those lines that can be produced and  
> officially labelled anytime during the development cycle to make a  
> much wanted feature available "as-is" and right away without going  
> through the full release process? I'm just asking. I proposed that  
> for MapServer way back when and it was turned down, but I thought I  
> would raise that possibility with you just in case you see a need  
> for that.

I like this idea.  This could also be considered an Alpha release -  
known issues and not feature complete, but perhaps useful.  PSC, want  
to include a Snapshot Release?

>
> Daniel
> -- 
> Daniel Morissette
> http://www.mapgears.com/

+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
|Paul Spencer                          pspencer at dmsolutions.ca    |
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|Chief Technology Officer                                         |
|DM Solutions Group Inc                http://www.dmsolutions.ca/ |
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