[Framework-Team] [Plone-installers] [Board] Roadmap and Release schedule for Plone 5.2 and 6.0

Fri Mar 1 08:17:07 UTC 2019

Good Morning!

I'm aware that is not my place to decide and that we need to agree on a release-date. But unsurprisingly I disagree. I've stated multiple times over the last year that a release-date of 5.2 early in 2019 is critical. We were aiming for February, so we're already is month late with the proposed date of 30.03.2019.  

The reasoning behind a early release is not new: The Plone community suffers from a severe case of hen-and-egg syndrome. Until a final version is released nobody tests that new version. And once it is released people complain that it was not tested properly. The only way out of that is to release early and follow-up with bugfix-release as soon as serious issues are found and fixed. 

I'm certain that postponing the release by two month would not lead to more testing. Why should people start testing migrations now when they have not done it between November and now? Most people will only test it when the release is out.

But with 5.2 we have even greater urgency. There are people and organizations who are required to move to Python 3 by 1.1.2020. Giving them as much of a head-start as possible by release 5.2 by the end of march seems critical to me. 

We urged time and time again that people should start planning and testing their migrations to 5.2 and Python 3 asap. We tried to make it as easy as possible and much more accessible that ever before:

* We created a nightly demo-buld of 5.2 coredev that was online since May 2018 (http://demo-latest-py3.plone.org and http://demo-latest-py2.plone.org)
* We documented how to test 5.2 in various Python versions. 
* We documented the migration to Python 3 in detail (https://tinyurl.com/plonepy3). 

There are still many things to do as Paul mentioned:

* Translations need to be updated. English and German seems ok, others less so.
* The migration-guide from 5.1 to 5.2 needs some work. I'm on it.
* The porting-guide seems in a good state already.
* The Installers need to be updated.
* Marketing-Material and Newsitems needs to be prepared. The document that Timo and I started could to help with that (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1u_brtRx3lmw6-RORncZDJ59p_1bHaQEUENFb91K5l24)
* Parts of the documentation need to be updated.

None of this is a surprise. I don't see what should stop us from finishing these tasks in time for March 30th. We should get our shit together and do it.

Philip

> Am 01.03.2019 um 06:31 schrieb sven <sven at so36.net>:
> 
> Hi !
> 
> Same here, well said !
> 
> I am only talking here about the documentation part, the current state of the docs for 5.2 and 6 is far away from publishing.
> 
> Also, since we are on it, I would like to ask where I can find docs of Plone 6, like the new UI, etc.
> 
> We started to rewrite and rebuild the whole docs from scratch, so far this is working well and the quality, readability, etc improved a lot.
> 
> But since we have no idea what of the current docs will stay and which parts will be different we just have some basic covered, yet.
> 
> Please let us know (Open an issue) about docs of Plone 6.
> 
> The same goes with with things like bobtemplates, will they worl with Plone 6, should we adjust or remove them from the 'core' docs ?
> 
> Thanks !
> 
> On Thu, 2019-02-28 at 22:20 +0100, Paul Roeland wrote:
>> hi people, 
>> 
>> although it's not the role of the Board to direct the technical direction of Plone, I do want to signal that I have serious concerns about the proposed timeline for 5.2. 
>> Not only as a member of the Board, which has to keep an eye out for marketing, but also as member of the documentation team. 
>> 
>> I think one month between having a RC1 and a final is way too short. There is still a lot of polishing to be done, in (at least) the areas of
>> 	• documentation
>> 	• translations
>> 	• real-world testing of migrations to Python3
>> 	• development of installers that work for both Python2 and Python3
>> 	• ... and probably more
>> One of the criticisms that were uttered (not always in the nicest way, but that's beside the point) is that we should do better at Quality Assurance. That is also a marketing issue. 
>> 
>> So, while I fully support the idea of an ambitious to aggressive timeline, and also that we should reach RC status (meaning no more new features), I would strongly plead for more time, and a few RC releases. And then do a final around, let's say, June 1. 
>> 
>> 5.2 is an important release; it has been argued that in terms of effect it could have been a major release. Then, by all means, let's take it serious enough so that we have satisfactory translations, documentation, marketing messages, and a reasonably battle-tested migration experience before we call it a Final.
>> 
>> Paul Roeland
>> 
>> (Note: I'm only arguing urgently for a slowdown on the 5.2 release schedule. I like the ambition on the 6.0 schedule, although also there I think we're going to need a longer polishing time to make sure that we release with good translations, documentation, installing instructions and the like. In general we just need some time between feature-freeze and a good Quality-Assured release, with ribbons and glitter around it)
>> 
>> On Wed, Feb 27, 2019 at 12:39 PM Philip Bauer <bauer at starzel.de> wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Release-Schedule:
>>> - rc1 next week
>>> - final: 30.03.2019
>>> 
>>> 
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>> 
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> 