Re: [Tracker] Is tracker development dead?

[Jon Phillips <jon rejon org>]

On Fri, 2007-06-29 at 16:51 +0100, jamie wrote:
> On Fri, 2007-06-29 at 10:04 -0400, Jeff wrote:
> > > Why not check out the latest from svn? I just built it yesterday.
> > I think that was the point. You don't get something as important as
> > Tracker tested efficiently if you don't release early and often.
> >
> > Clinging to your code in SVN entitles you to 5% of the population
> > willing to test it. Releasing it has psychological benefits for you and
> > your users:
> > - you feel like you achieved milestones instead of endlessly committing
> > to SVN without seeing some hard, tangible achievement (I mean, having
> > releases early and often really helps motivation)
> > - your users trust you to make said releases instead of spending time
> > flaming Beagle without providing them means to see for themselves.
> > That's what I would call vapourware. I love the idea behind Tracker, but
> > this "any day now" has been going on for months
> > - your tarballs will most likely end up packaged for various distros.
> > Don't you seek world domination? You won't achieve it with 0.5.4, but I
> > know that 0.6 is a lot better and might help you with the conquering
> > plans.
> > - I don't want this project to look like the gaim 2.0 series that took
> > forever to come out. And now that those folks changed the name to
> > Pidgin, interestingly enough, they seem on a frenzy to make a small
> > release every three weeks. This is good.
> >
> > > I'd like to thank the folks working on Tracker for providing such a
> > > nice alternative to beagle.
> > Don't misunderstand me: I love this project and I want it to grow tall
> > and fast. This is why I'm siding with the original poster here.
> >
> > Providing "such a nice alternative to Beagle" currently means "providing
> > an SVN trunk version that is really good, and outdated releases that
> > make all the project look like crap".
>
>
> A balance is required between frequent releases and stability
>
> Too frequent a release with major functionality can cause endless pain
> and annoying bugs to end users - I believe beagle's reputation was
> tarnished in the past for this very reason (they are now wisely holding
> back from releasing too often to make sure their stuff is more stable)
>
> I agree its been a while since the last release but I have in the last
> few months been far too busy to get as much done on tracker as possible
> (sick father, busy at work, hectic social life etc) hence the repeated
> "any day now" failures. Also its not possible to give a firm date for
> release due to new bugs that crop up when doing new development.
>
> my situation is now improving so tracker development is picking up fast.
> Im confident of getting out 0.6 next week too (come sunday/monday I will
> make available a pre-release for you guys to test prior to doing a
> release later in the week).
>
> keep your eyes peeled for lots of check-ins over the weekend (including
> all the outstanding patches) - I have quite a bit of code thats been
> hanging around since the last check-in
>
>
> jamie.

One thing that has served Inkscape development quite well is to give out
SVN commit access more liberally, with the motto, 2 patches reviewed,
then SVN access and also patch first, discuss later.

IMO, it would be great to give more power to developers so that we can
all help keep this project moving along. Is this a possibility and/or
could you empower a few more key people so we can increase the bus count
of this project beyond one :)

Jon

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-- 
Jon Phillips

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