[OpenLayers-Dev] OpenLayers 2.4 Release

[Andreas Hocevar]

Hi,

On 5/30/07, Christopher Schmidt <crschmidt at metacarta.com> wrote:
> On Wed, May 30, 2007 at 04:17:45PM +0200, Andreas Hocevar wrote:
> > I opened a trac ticket too short before 2.4 release
> > (http://trac.openlayers.org/ticket/726), containing a patch to support
> > toggle type buttons in button panels.
> > Do you think this can still be pulled into a 2.4 release?
> We don't do x.y.z releases, in general. It's possible we can make an
> exception for Mapbuilder -- I'd need to be convinced. One thing that
> would be important for me to understand is how Mapbuilder plans to do
> management of their OpenLayers build, since it seems clear to me that
> this kind of thing is going to happen all the time, and I can't be in
> favor of something that has us constantly trying to release for other
> software projects.

Sure, I understand that. It was just an idea in a team meeting a few
weeks ago to use an OpenLayers release for a Mapbuilder release. But
that is by no means a must.

> I think your options are either 'a trunk version' or 'a patched 2.4'. In
> either case, applying the 'patches' can be as simple as a couple dozen
> lines in a js file: look at the beginning of init() in
> http://tilecache.org/demo.html for an example. I basically end up
> patching OL in some way for every demo I create -- and that's okay,
> because Javascript is friendly to that, and when the next version comes
> out, I can remove those local modifications.

Yes, we could use a local copy of an OpenLayers release and apply
patches to it, of course with documented reference to the according
OpenLayers trac tickets.

> I'm not the only person who gets a voice in this, but I'd be against it
> without a compelling explanation of why other technical means can't
> suffice. Imagine a situation where Sarissa needs a patch in order for
> Mapbuilder to ship: How would you proceed? Can this same process be
> applied to OpenLayers?

Ties with OpenLayers are somewhat stronger than with Sarissa. We are
trying to contribute features to OpenLayers that fit better there than
in Mapbuilder. My main concern is not about OpenLayers releases for
Mapbuilder, but for useful features making their way into OpenLayers
generally. And therefore I am happy when my patches make it into
OpenLayers trunk. But that is just my opinion, other Mapbuilder
developers might think different about it.

Regards,
Andreas.