On Nov 26, 2009, at 5:56 AM, Jason van Zyl wrote: > > On 2009-11-26, at 8:04 AM, Todd Thiessen wrote: > >> I can only speak from experience with what we have done here internally but >> I can also attest that releasing too often is a real pain. You end up having >> a bunch of releases publicized that no one cares about. It only serves to >> clutter a repository and makes it confusing to consumers wrt which one to >> use. >> >> I love the agile model of development but I don't think this equates to >> "releasing something immediately if there are fixes available" as Jason put >> it. The release needs to be weighed against the value it provides and the >> extra time and effort the community needs to soak and test that release. >> Agile states that your software should be releasable at anytime, but it does >> not state that it should be continually released. >> >> Of course, the opposite (ie: not releasing enough) is just as bad if not >> worse. Have to find that sweet spot ;-). >> > > The logic here is flawed because it is from a single perspective of an > individual who finds it burdensome to validate each and every release.
I don't understand why that logic is flawed. The individual in question would be on the Maven PMC and not have time to validate all the releases. Asking them to spend their time every week validating releases is a bit much. > > The value of releasing everyday if there is a fix is because that fix may be > very valuable to a user. That value is illusory. The end user is far more likely to get pissed off that their Maven version is always out of date. People really don't like upgrading all that often. Alphas are a little different since end users obviously have some reason that they want to test the new functionality, but even there you can't expect them to download a release start testing their stuff and before they are even done a new release is out. > > I pushed extremely aggressively against Benjamin and Igor to put in place the > regression test suite and performance framework so that we don't have to fear > validation for the most part. I'm confident at this point that we're going to > find the problems before any of you do 95% of the time. This is how it should > be. When we have a fix it should be made immediately available in a > consumable form by the general public because it probably matters to someone. > We are at this point responding to people taking the time to accurate report > errors. If you watch the process that happens it usually a matter of hours > before Benjamin fixes it. I have no problem with building in test coverage. More is better. > > The release process here is entirely broken from a users perspective, but > that's the Apache Way. You know, I really dislike it when you throw this nonsense around. It gives the board the impression that the Maven community doesn't belong at Apache when these sentiments are mostly just yours. The Apache Way is "community over code". That means sometimes you have to do things that are beneficial for the community that may not be beneficial to a single individual. > Here people think developers are more important then users which is why we > have the contorted set of practices we have here now. No. The community is more important than a single user. I don't view the requirement of having at least 3 PMC members test a release and approve it as "contorted". > The work needs to be instantly validated and we can do that now, and once > that criterion is met it should be released. This is not the case with many > of our plugins which can have a dire impact on users because the tests for > critical plugins that just haven't gotten the attention they need yet. I plan > to help try and fix this as well but there's only so much that can be done at > a time. > > These are alphas and getting them out as soon as the rules allow here is > important for people trying to evaluate 3.x. No one is arguing about getting alphas out quickly. But taking your argument to its logical conclusion would imply that a fix is done in the morning and a release is performed by lunch. Then another fix is done and a release is performed in the afternoon. Or perhaps we have 8 releases that day. Where is the value in that? The simple fact is that there is a point at which people are "comfortable" with releases being made. IMO once a day is too much and once a month is way too slow. Ralph --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@maven.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@maven.apache.org
