+1 to what you've stated here Mick with a question: where did we land on flagging new features as experimental? Seems like it's an "at author's discretion" - search of the list turned up not too much structure there. Had a statement to that effect from Benjamin here <https://lists.apache.org/thread/hq8xsch9cxp3hdn1yo0d7jv77jwroccv>.
I ask because I think there's *a lot* in 5.0 and it's not clear to me that the various features have been exercised in comparable ways to gain confidence in their prod readiness. For 5.0 we have (or will likely have): 1. Trie Memtables 2. Trie Indexed Tables 3. UCS 4. SAI 5. Vector Search 6. Transactional Metadata 7. Accord While 6 (TrM) can't fall under that umbrella for architectural reasons, for the rest the label might be useful. Flip side, of course, is the argument that the features should be exercised heavily enough (unit, dtest, harry, simulator, in qa env, etc) before merge that nothing merges in that's not prod ready; don't know if that's true or not for all the features above (genuinely don't know; not looking to spread FUD), and it's not immediately obvious to me that that's the optimal way for us to balance innovation vs. stabilization. Basically I think it'd be nice if "Experimental" fostered more safe innovation and expansion in our ecosystem rather than being something of a pariah dumping ground to retroactively apply to things that have proven unstable or not completed. :) Plus there'd be value in signaling that to users. Hm. I think that implies feature categories of "alpha (experimental, may be removed (see MV's))", "beta (api stable and expected to be prod-hardened)", and then prod ready. Bit of a pandora's box now that I type this out; sorry. On Wed, Jul 26, 2023, at 6:38 PM, J. D. Jordan wrote: > > I think this plan seems reasonable to me. +1 > > -Jeremiah > >> On Jul 26, 2023, at 5:28 PM, Mick Semb Wever <m...@apache.org> wrote: >> >> >> The previous thread¹ on when to freeze 5.0 landed on freezing the first week >> of August, with a waiver in place for TCM and Accord to land later (but >> before October). >> >> With JDK8 now dropped and SAI and UCS merged, the only expected 5.0 work >> that hasn't landed is Vector search (CEP-30). >> >> Are there any objections to a waiver on Vector search? All the groundwork: >> SAI and the vector type; has been merged, with all remaining work expected >> to land in August. >> >> I'm keen to freeze and see us shift gears – there's already SO MUCH in 5.0 >> and a long list of flakies. It takes time and patience to triage and >> identify the bugs that hit us before GA. The freeze is about being "mostly >> feature complete", so we have room for things before our first beta >> (precedence is to ask). If we hope for a GA by December, account for the 6 >> weeks turnaround time for cutting and voting on one alpha, one beta, and one >> rc release, and the quiet period that August is, we really only have >> September and October left. >> >> I already feel this is asking a bit of a miracle from us given how 4.1 went >> (and I'm hoping I will be proven wrong). >> >> In addition, are there any objections to cutting an 5.0-alpha1 release as >> soon as we freeze? >> >> This is on the understanding vector, tcm and accord will become available in >> later alphas. Originally the discussion¹ was waiting for Accord for alpha1, >> but a number of folk off-list have requested earlier alphas to help with >> testing. >> >> >> ¹) https://lists.apache.org/thread/9c5cnn57c7oqw8wzo3zs0dkrm4f17lm3
