This is a highly appropriate change and one that should be understood and accepted by the user base. My spouse, a PhD in computer science, predicted some weeks ago that this change would come and now it has. I, for one, have every confidence that development will continue as aggressively as it has in the past and that the Flex team will remain open to suggestions and reports of difficulty.
Bill KJ4SLP On Tue, Jul 20, 2010 at 6:45 PM, Stephen Hicks, N5AC <[email protected]>wrote: > FlexRadio Systems was born of open source software. In the early days > there > were a number of individuals contributing to the source base. The entire > software defined radio community has benefited greatly as capabilities were > added by these individuals outside of the company as FlexRadio was building > PowerSDR. All of us at FlexRadio would first like to say a heart-felt > *THANK > YOU* to all of the individuals that have contributed. A significant number > of our customers enjoy and have grown accustomed to using the public source > code repository, SVN, as changes were made daily and hourly to the code > base > by these individuals. A few of these enthusiasts have become part of our > Beta software team, testing new features we add to the software and helping > us create better software. > > *As the company has grown over the last few of years, several changes have > occurred:* > 1. We are no longer serving just the enthusiasts and experimenters, but > also > pragmatists, and the demand for high quality, reliable software has risen > 2. PowerSDR has transitioned from an experimenter's platform to software > that many use in a "production environment" > 3. As the features and capabilities have grown, much of the "low hanging > software fruit" is gone and many of those that were contributing have moved > on to other challenging projects. There are literally only a couple of > individuals outside the company still contributing to the code base > 4. FlexRadio has made the move from ad hoc development to a defined > software > process which includes active management of priorities, regular releases, > automated software builds and eventually automated testing > 5. PowerSDR is now released with an industry standard integrated > installation rather than a "binary drop" more prevalent in the open source > world > 6. As we release versioned software (such as 2.0.5), we know every change > in > the software by either a defect number (DE#) or user story number (US#) > 7. We have incorporated a number of proprietary software packages in > PowerSDR that cannot be placed on an open source SVN, requiring us to > maintain two SVN repositories, one public and one private, and requiring a > more complex build process that pulls from both repositories. > 8. We have more than doubled the size of our software staff in the last > year > 9. Occasionally, users that are not prepared to use Alpha software (SVN) > will load the software and then require support resources to downgrade to a > supported version. While our official policy is that we do not provide > this > kind of support, most of you know that we generally help out anyway (hey, > we're just nice guys!). This has increased our support costs, however, and > these costs must be passed on to customers. > 10. We are seeing defects ("bugs") reported against interim states of the > repository (SVN xxxx) that are essentially noise for us since the > repository > is in a state of flux most of the time > 11. We are on the precipice of dramatically increasing our network usage > with automated builds and automated tests running against an Internet > source > repository > > ...in short, we're growing up! > > With all of these changes, the drawbacks of maintaining a public SVN > repository now outweigh the benefits of maintaining one. We would far > prefer to hear issues reported against specific versions of software > (2.0.5) > instead of an SVN version. As a result of this and our new software > process, we have made the following changes: > > 1. The public SVN will no longer be updated by FlexRadio Systems as a > general rule, but may remain online for some period of time. This was not > a > decision we took lightly, but there were no dissenters either -- everyone > close to us said "yes, you need to do that" after seeing how we work > 2. Day to day development on PowerSDR will be performed on the internal > source code repository > 3. We are using an Agile methodology for development that incorporates many > of the KPAs/practices of both Scrum and eXtreme Programming (XP) > 4. We are using development iterations which culminate in a complete > versioned build of the software on a periodic basis (a.k.a. internal > release) > 5. These internal releases are tested internally and sent to our Beta > testers. If we feel that releasing the software to the public is > warranted, > we will post the release on our website (distribute binaries). In general, > we will do this anytime we have added functionality but have not broken > anything significant. The output of the testing will also be a set of > release notes explaining any issues we found during testing. We hope these > will help you make an intelligent decision about using that particular > software release. > 6. Some releases will advance from our Beta test team to the FlexEdge group > for further testing and then periodically we will produce a general > availability release that we recommend all customers use > > We know for some, this will not be a welcome change. There may be a > perception that benefits are being removed. We understand this, but there > are big gains from what we are doing: We are now more rapidly than ever > fixing defects and adding features that result in better software. We are > more focused than ever before and we are regularly looking at the issues > and > ideas brought to us by our awesome customers (you). By removing focus on > issues reported against software we knew was in flux when the defect was > found, we are able to add focus on fixing problems that exist in software > we > have officially released. This means better software, faster to you, our > customers. > > For those wishing to receive a source drop when we release binaries, you > may > send an email request to [email protected] with the binary version for > which you need source. We will not be publishing internal code base > monikers with software releases, instead preferring defect reports against > released binary packages with dotted version numbers (2.0.5). You > *must*include the dotted release number in order to receive source. > Source will > be promptly delivered per the GPL. > > I truly love software development and I love our products. We have reached > an inflection point where we could continue as we were or we could grow up > and serve you better. We've made the decision to grow up and I hope you > are > able to see what this means for you, our valued customers. I would be > happy > to address any questions or concerns you may have with these changes! > > 73, > Steve > > Stephen Hicks, N5AC, AAR6AM > VP Engineering > FlexRadio Systems™ > 13091 Pond Springs Road, #250 > Austin, TX 78729 > Phone: 512-535-4713 x205 > Email: [email protected] > Web: www.flex-radio.com > > > > *Tune In Excitement™* > PowerSDR™ is a trademark of FlexRadio Systems > _______________________________________________ > Flexedge mailing list > [email protected] > http://mail.flex-radio.biz/mailman/listinfo/flexedge_flex-radio.biz > This is the FlexRadio Systems e-mail Reflector called FlexEdge. It is used > for posting topics related to SDR software development and experimentalist > who are using beta versions of the software. > -- Be a REAL American patriot: Bring our young men and women home. Feed the hungry and house the homeless Assure health care for everyone. Protect the environment. Wage peace all over the world. _______________________________________________ Flexedge mailing list [email protected] http://mail.flex-radio.biz/mailman/listinfo/flexedge_flex-radio.biz This is the FlexRadio Systems e-mail Reflector called FlexEdge. It is used for posting topics related to SDR software development and experimentalist who are using beta versions of the software.
