[Numpy-discussion] 1.8 release

[Charles R Harris]

On Sun, Jan 13, 2013 at 4:26 PM, Nathaniel Smith <njs at pobox.com> wrote:

> On Sun, Jan 13, 2013 at 7:03 PM, Charles R Harris
> <charlesr.harris at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Now that 1.7 is nearing release, it's time to look forward to the 1.8
> > release. I'd like us to get back to the twice yearly schedule that we
> tried
> > to maintain through the 1.3 - 1.6 releases, so I propose a June release
> as a
> > goal. Call it the Spring Cleaning release. As to content, I'd like to see
> > the following.
> >
> > Removal of Python 2.4-2.5 support.
> > Removal of SCons support.
> > The index work consolidated.
> > Initial stab at removing the need for 2to3. See Pauli's PR for scipy.
> > Miscellaneous enhancements and fixes.
>
> I'd actually like to propose a faster release cycle than this, even.
> Perhaps 3 months between releases; 2 months from release n to the
> first beta of n+1?
>
> The consequences would be:
> * Changes get out to users faster.
> * Each release is smaller, so it's easier for downstream projects to
> adjust to each release -- instead of having this giant pile of changes
> to work through all at once every 6-12 months
> * End-users are less scared of updating, because the changes aren't so
> overwhelming, so they end up actually testing (and getting to take
> advantage of) the new stuff more.
> * We get feedback more quickly, so we can fix up whatever we break
> while we still know what we did.
> * And for larger changes, if we release them incrementally, we can get
> feedback before we've gone miles down the wrong path.
> * Releases come out on time more often -- sort of paradoxical, but
> with small, frequent releases, beta cycles go smoother, and it's
> easier to say "don't worry, I'll get it ready for next time", or
> "right, that patch was less done than we thought, let's take it out
> for now" (also this is much easier if we don't have another years
> worth of changes committed on top of the patch!).
> * If your schedule does slip, then you still end up with a <6 month
> release cycle.
>
> 1.6.x was branched from master in March 2011 and released in May 2011.
> 1.7.x was branched from master in July 2012 and still isn't out. But
> at least we've finally found and fixed the second to last bug!
>
>
Actually, the first branch was late Dec 2011, IIRC, maybe Feb 2012. We've
had about a year delay and I'm not convinced it was worth it.


> Wouldn't it be nice to have a 2-4 week beta cycle that only found
> trivial and expected problems? We *already* have 6 months worth of
> feature work in master that won't be in the *next* release.
>
> Note 1: if we do do this, then we'll also want to rethink the
> deprecation cycle a bit -- right now we've sort of vaguely been saying
> "well, we'll deprecate it in release n and take it out in n+1.
> Whenever that is". 3 months definitely isn't long enough for a
> deprecation period, so if we do do this then we'll want to deprecate
> things for multiple releases before actually removing them. Details to
> be determined.
>
>
Deprecations should probably be time based.


> Note 2: in this kind of release schedule, you definitely don't want to
> say "here are the features that will be in the next release!", because
> then you end up slipping and sliding all over the place. Instead you
> say "here are some things that I want to work on next, and we'll see
> which release they end up in". Since we're already following the rule
> that nothing goes into master until it's done and tested and ready for
> release anyway, this doesn't really change much.
>
> Thoughts?
>
>
I think three months is a bit short. Much will depend on the release
manager and I not sure what  Andrej's plans are. I'd happily nominate you
for that role ;)

Chuck
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