Sorry that this may be off the topic of development but there has been a lot of conversation on this list lately about the future of the distro.
There have been many questions concerning the direction of the GPL SME Server. I certainly can't speak for the community, but I can speak for contribs.org and its core team. We have been working out our priorities and how to get them done, and I'd like to share our thoughts. This is only a rough plan and we can certainly be overwhelmed by events but here's where we are: Our immediate goals: - Build a solid infrastructure at contribs.org. We have gone from about 350K hits per month to over a million per month in two weeks. Talk about a stress test :> We're adding hardware and working hard to build a faster, more efficient interface. We hope to bring this online in the next 30 days or so. - Get out a GPL version of the 6.0 ISO. We have had some great help from a lot of you on this and hope to have this out in the next few weeks. We're not promising but we're goaling for a Happy New Year. This ISO will have only minor cosmetic changes and the latest bug fixes that we can manage. This prediction will clearly come back to haunt me in the near future. We now have a MUCH better understanding of why the Mitel folks never announced release dates :> First Quarter 2004: - Keep the RedHat 7.3 base. The SME Server is a solid, reliable, and feature rich project just the way it is because Mitel invested thousands of hours into making it that way. Their gift to us is huge. We simply don't have the resources to second guess the build platform in the near term. Nor do we need to. This distro will last a long while with bug and security fixes only. - Fix RH 7.3 errata and look for help in maintaining packages. This help could come from the community and/or from external sources. It's not possible to determine the best course quite yet. - Establish a methodology for relasing 7.3 errata and security fixes - Establish a bug tracking system and knowledgebase that allows for community input and help. - Establish, if possible, a "certification" process for contribs that will allow the community to know that a certain contrib has been tested and is known to work. We have a lot of work to do on this before we're ready to roll this one out. - Establish a metodology for rolling out new rev's to update for errata and feature enhancements. Hard to shcedule these but we're goaling for "release early and often". We still stress that we're running on a 7.3 base during this process. We can enhance and maintain without having to build a new platform. Second Quarter 2004: - Here is where we should have a serious look under the hood and see where the RH community as a whole is moving. By then we should be able to better forecast what the true life cycle of the RH base is and potentially find some other sources of help to migrate if required. Third Quarter 2004: - Begin the base beta process for a new distro (again, only if required) Fourth Quarter 2004: - Continue base beta and, if very lucky, start looking at a release condidate First Quarter 2005: - Relaese final new distro These are frankly very aggressive development goals and we'll need all the help we can get to hit them. None of this is to say that discussion of potential new distros or any other thoughts shouldn't take place now. It's just to say that as we look at the "real" requirements of doing this work, two things immediately happen. 1. We admire the folks at Mitel who "really" got it done 2. We better understand the huge body of work ahead of us. I truly believe we can do this. There is a huge wealth of talent in the community and we have been overwhelmed at the offers for help in personal efforts, money, and hardware. If we pull together and are patient, this will be a true open source community success story. Contribs.org is committed to this project. We hope you are too. That's my 2 cents. Cheers, -jeff On behalf of contribs.org Jeff Coleman Resource Strategies, Inc. "The Intelligent Use of Technology" Tollfree: 877-718-7628 x401 Fax: 520-797-0394 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.rstrat.com -- Please report bugs to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Please mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] (only) to discuss security issues Support for registered customers and partners to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Searchable archive at http://www.mail-archive.com/devinfo%40lists.e-smith.org