state of release and release plan

[Jaroslaw Staniek]

On 26 October 2016 at 14:03, Dag <danders at get2net.dk> wrote:

> Hi
> Another month came and went, and not much happened...
> I'm actually a little afraid of releasing because we might attract some
> users.
> Well, to be more precise, that there will be nobody to support those users.
> An example; a user posed a question about words on the forum close to 2
> months ago, still no answer.
> I don't know enough to determine if the problem he ahs is just a matter of
> doing it the right way or if it is a bug or a limitation in odt or
> something else. It would take me a lot of time to find out so it would be
> much better if someone in the know (eg Camilla) could have answered.
>
> I would support plan of course, but what about words and sheets?
> Camila and Tomas; what are you able to commit to, are there others?
> I'm willing to set aside other stuff I'm working on to help, but I would
> need guidance to get anything done in a reasonable time and reviews of
> course, so I don't mess up too much.
>
> Also, not to be forgotten, KChart and KGantt needs to be released.
>
>
Right, Dag.
Like you, I am wondering too about this great code base.
In order to be closer to reality, let's admit, software releases take time
too. I've not seen many commits recently to calligra.git to say at least,
yet activities moving us closer to release. The commits I see are mostly
for Plan or are build fixes.

Even if the first release (beta) is out, it wouldn't be the last; continued
commitment is needed.

So I think it's time to propose alternatives that help to reduce the
overhead.
What I would imagine?

- stop releasing tarballs and instead only publish git tags
- publish automated change logs based on git logs for tag-x.y.z-1..tag-x.y.z

This reduces overhead to 10 minutes per release or so if I understand it
correctly.
Any saved energy could got to updating the build recipes and forum support.

I am aware of incompatibility[1] with KDE's approach and what OS
distributors expect but OTOH it's better than silence and it's not
incompatible with today's GitHub-oriented mindset of software developers.
Thousands of low-profile projects do that. If someone is interested in the
source code and building/distributing binaries, this form of distribution
is acceptable.

My 0.02PLN.

I'd be interested in other proposals.


[1] Who contributes, decides. Anyone is free to get it back to the
traditional workflow.


Cheers, Dag.
>
>
> Friedrich W. H. Kossebau skrev den 2016-09-20 01:33:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Am Samstag, 2. Juli 2016, 08:17:40 CEST schrieb Camilla Boemann:
>>
>> I think it's time we get a release out. We are stuck with not much work
>>> going on so inspired by Dag's return let's do a push to get ready.
>>>
>>> I think we should cut down on the number of applications so we have
>>> something manageble left. It's tough but the alternative is that Calligra
>>> dies completely. And nothing prevents us from bringing apps back  later.
>>>
>>> So my question is: What is missing for us to have a release. I am not
>>> talking about all the nice to have features and bug fixes. I am asking
>>> what
>>> would create huge problems for our users if we release.
>>>
>>> Let's get things listed. I'll start:
>>>
>>
>> Karbon: let's exclude from first release
>>>
>>
>> From my testing it mainly works, so no real difference to Stage or Words
>> IMHO
>> So I would vote for include. Perhaps mark as experimental.
>>
>> Flow: let's exclude from first release
>>>
>>
>> Agreed. There would be also nothing to release :) Flow has not been ported
>> even, as the plan of its maintainer was to make Flow another UI to the
>> Karbon
>> libs, optimized for Flow-specific use-cases. Just, has not happened yet.
>>
>> Braindump: let's drop it completely
>>>
>>
>> It has been ported, build and works. Pity for the work done there. But
>> agreed.
>> No maintainer, no users known. Time tp git rm.
>>
>> Gemini:
>> incomplete port to QtQuick2 -> not part of release, already marked as
>> STAGING
>>
>> Format Filters:
>> guess anything that builds is on similar state as with 2.9. At least all
>> my
>> test files still work.
>>
>> Okular plugins:
>> depend on unreleased Okular/KF5, work with current devel branch.
>> so fine keep included in release builds.
>> Okular/KF5 might be finally in KA 16.12
>>
>> Other extras:
>> thumbnail etc. also work, so no reason to exclude
>>
>> Cheers
>> Friedrich
>>
>


-- 
regards, Jaroslaw Staniek

KDE:
: A world-wide network of software engineers, artists, writers, translators
: and facilitators committed to Free Software development - http://kde.org
Calligra Suite:
: A graphic art and office suite - http://calligra.org
Kexi:
: A visual database apps builder - http://calligra.org/kexi
Qt Certified Specialist:
: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jstaniek
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