New release "layout": no more alpha, no more RC, just beta

[Inge Wallin]

On Thursday, March 14, 2013 10:15:53 Cyrille Berger wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> As a reminder, our current layout is:
> Week 0 -> tag alpha
> Week 3 -> branch and tag beta
> Week 6 -> tag RC
> Week 9 -> tag final
> 
> After some discussions, it has been suggested to do the following
> layout:
> 
> Week 3 -> branch and tag beta 1
> Week 6 -> tag beta 2
> Week 9 -> tag final
> 
> The rational was that alpha are just snapshots, probably not worth much
> and still require some work (especially in the marketing department).

That is not necessarily a bad thing.  True, it is work, but it leads to some 
PR.  But I agree I don't think it's worth it.

> As
> for RCs, the rational was that it is not very understandable what a "RC"
> is, while beta is a much wider acknowledge term for "not stable (and
> might kill kittens)", the second thing is that the version label is part
> of the tag, and once the tarballs are given for packaging it is a bit
> tricky to change the version, which might be a bit iky if we discover a
> severe bug between tagging and actual release.
> 
> So anyone has any object to the new layout, with no alpha, and two
> betas and one final ?

No, I think the suggestion is good.  But 9 weeks is just 2 months.  I think 
that's far, far too short for a full release cycle.