State of the release

[Graham Percival]

Ok, now that any doubts about my meta-april fool's joke are over,
I'd like to sound out opinions about 2.14.


GOOD NEWS

I think we've finally resolved our "technical debt" -- it's been a
while since I've seen Critical issues that were introduced over a
year ago.  The remaining Critical issues are things that we
introduced in the past 2-3 weeks.


BAD NEWS

On the bad side of things, we have Critical issues that we
introduced in the past 2-3 weeks.  If those bugs hadn't slipped
in, then my April fool's joke might not have been a joke.

... wow, that would have been an even better meta-joke.  Almost
everybody would think it _was_ a prank, but then when it turned
out that the binaries were actually there... lol, eh?  :)


CHOICE TIME

For the past few months, I've been occupied with teaching, so I
deliberately decided that I wouldn't jump up and down and try to
get a stable release out.  If it happened, it'd happen; if not, no
worries.  We had four release candidates, starting on 12 Jan until
a few days ago.

Development at the moment feels "comfortable".  That's not
necessarily a bad thing, of course!  But I don't think that we're
getting as much done as we _could_ be doing.


I'm reminded of the dilemma faced by conductors of amateur
orchestras (and probably choirs, theatrical groups, etc).  Some
people (such as myself) like a strict conductor who always demands
their best; rehearsals are always stressful, but very productive
and (to me) fulfilling.  Other people prefer a relaxed atmosphere;
they come to orchestra after a hard day's work, they haven't
touched their instrument in the past week... but they have enough
stress in their lives and certainly won't put up with a conductor
yelling at them.  Neither group is objectively "right"; it's
simply a question of deciding what type of orchestra you want to
have.

In a similar way, I'm wondering how we want to approach the next
few weeks.  When somebody introduces a regression, should we frown
at them (and maybe revert the bad commit), or just shrug and
laugh?  Should we try to have a "sprint" towards resolving the
current crop of Critical issues and get 2.14 out the door, or just
let it happen "when it happens"?

I won't be making any releases from 09 May to 24 May, but I don't
think we need to worry about a gap of 2 weeks for releases.


Cheers,
- Graham