MapServer 5.0 release plan

[Daniel Morissette]

Howard Butler wrote:
> 
> My opinion is that we let AGG support hold up the 5.0 release until it 
> is workable enough to be out there in the wild.  Premium cartographic 
> output is enough of a draw (sorry) for folks coming to MapServer that 
> they will be willing to put up with its quirks to get it.  I'd also like 
> to see the dust settle on RFCs 19 and 24, because IMO a major version 
> release is the one time I think we can get away with it.
> 

Makes sense. I think it would be nice if the developers working on those 
items could give us an idea of when they think those pieces will be 
ready for a release.


> I like these dates as good targets.  I think to get serious about a 5.0 
> release we should start having at least monthly IRC developer meetings 
> to prioritize stuff and see where everyone is with their developments.
> 

Agreed. I have been following the MapGuide IRC meetings while I was the 
MapGuide incubation mentor and found that it's great for a project to 
bring all the developers in the same room every once in a while. Even 
when there is not much to discuss on the agenda, there are always useful 
discussions that come up when everybody is in the room and make the 1 
hour meeting worthwhile.

I could take the lead on organizing monthly IRC meetings unless someone 
else wants to do it.


> re: #2 Does this happen at the mapserver, GDAL/OGR, or Proj level?

Not decided yet. The first step of this task is to look at the 
possibiliy of doing the EPSG lookup optimizations either at the 
MapServer or at the PROJ level, and then choose the option that makes 
the most sense. Of course doing it at the PROJ level would be preferable 
if possible since the result would be reusable by any code using PROJ 
and not just MapServer.

> re: #4 Would libxml2 be in the cards for this, or would we continue on 
> the current path?

Ehrrrr... um... have you seen how sunny it is today?  ;) ;)

(I'll keep a note about possibly converting the code to libxml2, but the 
initial plan was only to add WMS 1.3.0 support on top of the currently 
supported versions... and using the current printf-based approach)

> re: #6.  IIRC, the OGR C API doesn't have full support for the styling 
> stuff, which was one of the things holding up our migration to 
> mapogr.c.  Will there be some changes in the OGR C API as well?
> 

I will also make any required changes to the OGR C API to make this work 
(and submit RFCs to GDAL's PSC as needed).

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