[OFBiz] Dev - Proposal for CVS tags to improve release process

[David Jones]

I'd love to follow a release process like Tomcat's. Of course, I'd also  
love to have dedicated staff sponsored by large companies (or small or  
whoever) that are working even part-time on maintaining the project and  
developing the software...

At the moment OFBiz is totally community driven, and the community  
seems to be mostly made up of smaller companies with limited resources.  
This means that nothing gets done unless someone in the community does  
it or pays someone to do it. There are certain things that have been  
talked up a lot in the community, but no effort or money has been put  
into them. For some of these things the dichotomy is absolute. For  
example, with documentation and the testing and stability of the  
project almost nothing has been contributed (with a couple of  
exceptions), and what little has been done has been sponsored by Andy  
and I in an attempt to help push the project along.

Not that I'm complaining about the situation, but it is a little tiring  
to hear complaints about these sorts of things when we live just fine  
without them and many others do too. I guess it comes down to people  
wanting the software to not only be free and open source, but they also  
want it to be as easy to use as possible.

Perhaps someday...

-David


On Aug 4, 2004, at 7:50 PM, Eric Carmichael wrote:

> As an ofbiz newbie who's using 3.0.0 purely out of ignorance of what's
> new and cool in CVS, I'm all for regular release notes and tagging.
>
> Of the open source projects I've been involved with, I think the one
> with the best release process has been Tomcat (which in turn uses the
> Apache HTTPD release process, documented here:
> http://httpd.apache.org/dev/release.html).
>
> Basically it's as you and Brett suggested, but after a suitable testing
> period, the community does a formal vote on the quality of each
> release.  This encourages the information-sharing that Brett mentioned
> (you generally have to give a reason if you vote against a release),
> makes it clear when a release is endorsed by the community, and, when a
> release is voted down, provides a clear list of bugs that have to be
> fixed.
>
> On the other hand, the position of Tomcat release manager is pretty
> time-consuming, so it may not be the best model here.  I just don't
> know; I'm as new to the community as I am to the code.
>
> Eric
>
>
> On Wed, 2004-08-04 at 17:18, Si Chen wrote:
>> Brett,
>>
>> I think it's a great idea and would definitely like to participate.
>>
>> I would like to see if it is possible to have cvs tags around
>> "relatively stable" points where most things are somewhat settled.  It
>> doesn't mean that everything needs to be thoroughly tested, but just
>> that the cvs is not in the midst of a major re-factorings and
>> development.  I think then, we can proceed as you suggested, and post
>> patches and notes against these tagged points.  After some time, these
>> tagged points ought to achieve some stability and be releasable.
>>
>> By the way, I am currently working from an April 8, 2004 version of  
>> the
>> cvs and would like to upgrade to a more current version some time in  
>> the
>> next month, so this is great timing as well.  Perhaps we could work
>> together on something like this?
>>
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Si
>>
>> Brett Palmer wrote:
>>
>>> I have written a short proposal for creating regular CVS tags in the
>>> ofbiz module to help improve the release process for the community.
>>> Here is the link to the wiki page.  If you have other ideas please
>>> share them.
>>>
>>> http://ofbizwiki.go-integral.com/Wiki.jsp? 
>>> page=ProposedReleaseStrategy
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>>
>>> Brett
>>>
>>> /********************   Here is the text version of the proposal
>>> ***************************/
>>>
>>>
>>> Stategy for OFBiz Releases
>>>
>>> In the April 2004 OFBiz Users Conference we discussed ideas for
>>> improving OFBiz releases.  This wiki page continues this discussion
>>> with the hope that the user community can come up with a strategy for
>>> helping the project develop a better release strategy.  Here are some
>>> of my thoughts.  Feel free to add your own thoughts and opinions.
>>>
>>> Current Release Strategy
>>>
>>> Currently there are no scheduled releases.  As David explained at the
>>> conference, official releases tend to occur after an OFBiz contract
>>> completes and new features have been added.  These are usually good
>>> release candidates because they have been fully tested and new
>>> features have been added.  The problem with this approach is that as  
>>> a
>>> community it is difficult to determine when you should upgrade your
>>> production system with the latest from OFBiz.
>>> How Can the Community Help?
>>>
>>> We all benefit greatly from the work of David, Andy and the other
>>> OFBiz contributors.  We can't ask them to take the time to develop
>>> release schedules and planning cycles for free.  As an alternative to
>>> this here is what I propose:
>>>
>>> 1. Tag the ofbiz module regularly:  I propose the ofbiz module be
>>> tagged at least once a month.  The tag could be something like
>>> OFBIZ_<DATE>  or <Some project name>_<DATE>.
>>> 2. Community develops release notes:  From the CVS tags the community
>>> can add release notes on this wiki site to discuss things like new
>>> added features, strategies for upgrading, changes in entity
>>> definitions, or bugs found.
>>>
>>> The above items would be simple to impelment and could help the
>>> community better manage OFBiz upgrades.  We are currently practicing  
>>> a
>>> similar strategy at my company.  At least once a month we do a CVS
>>> vendor import into our own ofbiz module and tag the module with the
>>> current date.  Then we run the newest updated ofbiz through a test
>>> cycle to determine what effect it will have on our production
>>> systems.  After the testing cycle we upgrade our production systems.
>>> Throughout this process we keep notes and develop database scripts to
>>> help with the upgrade.  On our development boxes we try to stay  
>>> within
>>> one month of the latest ofbiz source and on our production systems
>>> about 3 months.  This process helps us minimize the risk of updating
>>> directly from OFBiz's CVS respository while keeping us closely tied  
>>> to
>>> the latest code.  I believe there are other users performing a  
>>> similar
>>> process.  If we were able to make the above changes the community
>>> could share the information rather then keeping it to themselves.
>>> This way the whole community improves the process of upgrading ofbiz.
>>>
>>> Thoughts anyone?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> Brett Palmer
>>>
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>>>
>>
>>
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