[crossfire] 2.0 release, was Re: Code restructuring

[Alex Schultz]

Mark Wedel wrote:
>   Right - I don't think anyone right now is arguably against having the head be 
> bleeding edge and aimed for the next major release and another (or multiple) 
> stable branches.
>   
Agreed.
>   The question is what goes into the stable branch.  By its nature, everything 
> has to go into the head branch (presuming the change is still applicable).  But 
> the scope of changes for the minor releases in the stable branch probably 
> shouldn't be too big.
>   
Personally, I think things to go into the stable branch, are of course
things we want in minor releases, and in my opinion, that should be
bugfixes, and features that are not large/extensive. Of course, then the
difficulty is in defining how large or extensive makes it worth putting
in for the next major release, and that I believe needs to be decided in
a case-by-case basis.

>   I think also it may be best if all the major features go through design 
> discussions even if there isn't anyone that is necessarily going to work on them.
>
>   I know that for me personally, there are times when I am unexpectedly ready to 
> do some coding.  However, if it is going to take 2 weeks to get input from a 
> design document I write tonight, then 2 weeks from I may not have the time or 
> inclination.  So there needs to be something that people can just pick up when 
> ready.
>   
Many discussions on the mailing list are already ones where there isn't
necessarily anyone going to work on them :P

> 2.0 release.
> branch for 2.1 is made based on 2.0
> 2.1 is released, branch for 2.2 made based on current head code
> 2.2 is released, branch for 2.3 made based on current head code
>
>   If that is the model, then that really isn't any different than what we do 
> right now, which means by the time 3.0 is really released, it won't look that 
> much different than the last previous minor release, since the code for that 
> previous minor released was based on code pretty close to the 3.0 release code.
>   
Personally I would rather dislike that setup, though I don't believe
that is what he is trying to say. What I think he is trying to say is
more like:

2.0 release.
branch for 2.1 is made based on 2.0
2.1 is release, branch for 2.2 made based on 2.1
2.2 is release, branch for 2.3 made based on 2.2

That said, I don't see how that would end up much different from just a
branch for each major release, unless we plan on providing bugfix
releases for older releases, which I personally don't see a need to do.

Alex Schultz