[Framework-Team] Re: Re: Release roadmap for 3.0

[Martin Aspeli]

On Thu, 11 May 2006 16:45:34 +0100, Rocky Burt  
<rocky at serverzen.com> wrote:

> Hmm... this brings up an interesting point.  Whit has repeatedly
> commented that just because we're having .5 and .0 releases (with
> different focuses for each) doesn't mean we can't have a .1 (or .2
> or .3, etc) as well.
>
> For the sake of getting the SoC results in a place where Plone can use
> it (perhaps in core? perhaps for marketing?) why not tentatively plan a
> 3.1 release that focuses (but not necessarilly limited or restrained to)
> on the SoC achievements ?
>
> Plone 3.1 -- the google release :)
>
> - Rocky
>
> ps. I'm only throwing this out there without thinking through all of the
> repercussions for discussion purposes ... like how does this affect our
> (hopeful) 6 month release cycle?  how does this affect trying to match
> up with zope releases? etc

I think there is a lot of overhead associated with making a high-quality  
release. You need alpha cycles, beta cycles, rc cycles, testing, bug days,  
more testing, marketing, release announcements. Experience suggests that  
six months is about the shortest amount of time we manage to do all that  
and do it properly.

It also has something to do with the outward face of Plone to people who  
evaluate it. When you call something a point-oh, it means something. Plone  
3.0 means that we feel Plone has come a long way since 2.0 and even 2.5.  
It's sufficiently new and innovative to be called a new major release, not  
just a small, incremental improvement. That was, as I understood it, the  
premise of the alternating UI/framework focused releases. Give us up to a  
year to make the major UI innovations. Give us some time after those to  
ensure the framework underneath keep ticking, and that it is aligned with  
our stack, and that it's capable of delivering the next wave of  
user-facing, paradigm-shifting improvements.

I think 2.5 is a perfect example. So much of the groundwork that has gone  
into 2.5 enabled us in Norway to get productive with Zope 3 concepts  
quickly, to build exciting things that were just too difficult previously.  
To the end user, 2.5 is a pretty un-important release. To the developers  
like you and me, it's a very important release because it gives us a  
better stack to develop our products against. But to the world at large,  
to the people who evaluate Plone and see that this and that are great and  
cool and this that are notable by their absence, it's the point-oh, the  
big announcements that may even make it onto Slashdot and CMSWatch and  
elsewhere, that truly matter. And I think we need to funnel our energy  
into that as best we can, because that kind of buzz is what keeps us alive  
with fresh talent and money and customers.

Cheers,
Martin

-- 
"You can just adapt yourself out of it..." // Archipelago sprint 26/04/2006