the "gamma" proposal - details that need working out

[Tom Albers]

At Monday 09 July 2007 13:55, you wrote:
> "Gamma" is a real release, but not targeted at new end users (so it really 
> *is* 4.0, and *not* a release candidate. That thing has to be very clear. 

Now I'm confused. This is the text from Troy:
"
Our date for 4.0.0 would then be something like Jan 23rd or Feb 1st, which we really need to decide now so that we can start booking hotels and conference rooms and so forth in mountainview.
"
 
> - A 4.0 release, especially in the case of KDE will have glitches. Those 
> glitches might be acceptable for our current user base, but they're certainly 
> not to new target groups that we're looking at for KDE4. We're pushing KDE4 
> into the mainstream market which is much more critical about small glitches. 
> (This is based on research into target group characteristics, which I'm happy 
> to share if you want.)

Is this any different that a new major release of any other project. See people avoiding Vista as the plague currently?
 
> - Right now, it's quite hard for usability and accessibility people to review 
> KDE4, too much is moving. Same goes for translators. We need a real release 
> for those people to contribute in a meaningful way. (The lack of people 
> participating in HIG hunting shows this quite well.)

After beta 1 everything is frozen solid. After that there are still months to go. Translators still have a good period to translate, and they can start already (as usual).

> - KDE 4.0 will miss quite some applications, we might be able to ship a basic 
> set, but certainly not the comprehensive desktop we'd like to have ready.

I was not aware of that. Which apps are missing?

> - The release event needs some very time-critical planning. If we slip the 
> release, months of work will be ruined. (Imagine booking plane tickets for 
> people to visit the release event, having everything in place, just not the 
> release itself.)

I can understand that.
 
> - Marketing KDE4 towards the end-user, but giving distros virtually no time 
> (well, one week) to prepare a finished product renders it vapourware (it's 
> not available at that point).

They have several releases to practise this. This is hardly an argument.

> So technically, from a developer's point of view, it doesn't really change all 
> that much. 

Yes it does. As soon as we say that we are going to release 'gamma's' instead of real official releases and the official launch is early februari, a bunch of developers will sit back and watch E.T. again. I really feel it is the wrong signal.

> I think that the proposal is very sensible since it solves a 
> number of very real problems we're facing. 

If I understand it correctly, the 'problem' we want to tackle is that you want to release at a date close to a 'release party'-date. 

Toma