From: "Jacopo Cappellato" <jacopo.cappell...@hotwaxmedia.com>
We have recently discussed in a few threads some strategies for the definition of a release roadmap for OFBiz; I am summarizing
here the main points (old and new) because there seems to be a general agreement around them and we should be ready to officialize
them and then stick to this plan:
* the release roadmap will be time-based rather than feature-based
* every year a new release branch is created on April, generating a new Major Release Number in the format YY.MM (this is *not* a
release)
* from each active release branch we will release 2 releases every year (approx every 6 months); the names of the releases will be
YY.MM.<aa> where aa is a two digits sequential number (01 is the first release, 02 the second etc..)
* no more than 3 active release branches will be maintained simultaneously; for this reason we will close the oldest release
branch every year sometimes before April (when the new one is created)
An outstanding topic is the following:
* do we still want to wait approx 1 year before releasing the first release of
a branch?
I don't have a strong preference but maybe a stabilization period of 6 months could be enough... but I don't know. In the plan
below I am proposing a stabilization period of 10 months.
As a result of the above rules, we will release approx 5 releases per year considering the following lifecycle of a release
branch:
* created in April
* first year: stabilization; no new releases are created
* second year: two releases 01 and 02
* third year: two releases 03 and 04
* fourth year: one release 05 and then the branch is closed
If we name A (oldest), B and C (newest) the three active release branches, then
we could stick to the following roadmap:
C: new release on February and August
B: new release on March and September
A: new (last) release on April and then closed (when on April the new branch D
is created)
For me also 6 months seems long enough for the 1st official release. I'm just afraid: will we have not a lot of work to release so
often (relases themself, annunciations, site update and especially demos updates)
Anyway it seems we need to do it, maybe at the expense of other areas we are
working on (Jiras, users support, etc.)
Jacques
For example:
2015
Jan
Feb C1 (after mostly 10 months of stabilization)
Mar B3
Apr A5 (last); D is created
May
Jun
Jul
Aug C2
Sep B4
Oct
Nov
Dec
2016
Jan
Feb D1
Mar C3
Apr B5 (last); E is created
May
Jun
Jul
Aug D2
Sep C4
Oct
Nov
Dec
2016
Jan
Feb E1
Mar D3
Apr C5 (last); F is created
May
Jun
Jul
Aug E2
Sep D4
Oct
Nov
Dec
etc...
Kind regards
Jacopo
