Bruno Postle wrote: > Some of the very prominent strings in the GUI have changed so it > would be good to get some more translations updated before this next > release. > > We need to make translators aware that there will be a release > *soon*, I'm not sure we have done this.
yes, so far I did not announce beta1 and only announced beta2 here and not on the SourceForge system - I wanted to be sure of my tarballs. I'll issue beta3 (and not RC1) next. and I'll issue the call for translations in the release notes. Then I'll issue RC1 one week later. Then we can wait. Even indefinitely if that's the collective decision. The new development model is about branching. Like in nature, a branch does not always florish - whether it is a development or a release branch. It is possible to abandon a release branch at beta or RC stage. People vote with their feets, with their actions, with their wallets. In this case: if there is enough interest in a release volunteers will work on bringing the branch to the next level. If not the branch will linger and volunteers will continue to work on other branches (e.g. trunk). We are in a transition and it is the first time we use this new model. We need to observe and learn from our own collective behavior. In the past we were way to slow releasing. I have no control on volunteer resources. The only thing I can define is the level of quality at which I am ready to call it a release: 1. the code builds on the main supported platforms (Ubuntu, Fedora, OSX, Windows) 2. there is no functional regression unless intended Other may prefer higher (or lower) quality standards, including translations and testing. Everybody has their personal quality standards, and they are all right. I respect them. We have to compromize on and agree on the terms for Hugin release, not on the personal quality standards. There is a trade off between the level of quality and the cost and time associated with achieving it. Perfection can't be achieved, not even with money (although if translations are important, a bounty should not be that expensive. Depending on the language, commercial translation is less than 1$/word on the commercial market). I know of much less complex software packages than Hugin where testing before a *patch* release (e.g. security fix) is a six digits US$ figure (and still has very embarassing glitches). We can't afford this - neither in money nor in equivalent human time. To me volunteer contributors are like a fluid: they decide what they want to work on and when. I have very little leverage on them. The fluid flows magnetically attracted to where there is interest. If there is interest in a more polished release, the fluids will be attracted toward that branch. I am happy to observe that the fluids are attracted by 2009.2. In the meantime trunk has evolved and I start to be more attracted by it. I want to push lens calibration out to the general public. Not before bringing 2009.2 to a release. And after lens calibration there are other cool functionalities in line for integration and release. My vision is that by early 2010 we have absorbed all queued development branches / features and we can make a plan where we go from there, based on a robust, tried and tested parallel development process, with specified conditions for release. Maybe 1. the code builds on the main supported platforms (Ubuntu, Fedora, OSX, Windows) 2. there is no functional regression unless intended is too low a standard. It has been discussed on the GSoC 2009 mentors list as how to integrate the GSoC 2009 projects into trunk without running into the slow down of GSoC 2008 / 0.8.0 (where we took too big a bite at once and were delayed for months of fixing). We can re-open the discussion about the conditions for release here if there is enough interest. I would prefer this to happen after we released the GSoC 2009 code (three releases are planned) and learn from the experience. Yuv Yuv --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "hugin and other free panoramic software" group. A list of frequently asked questions is available at: http://wiki.panotools.org/Hugin_FAQ To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/hugin-ptx -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
