[Python-Dev] Re: Stability and change (original) (raw)

Christopher Petrilli petrilli@amber.org
Mon, 08 Apr 2002 18:58:05 -0400

On 4/8/02 6:31 PM, "Paul Hughett" <hughett@mercur.uphs.upenn.edu> wrote:

We could jump the micro release number to 100. [to mark the experimental to stable transition] -0 Why invent a new convention when a good one already exists? How do the development groups other than Linux make this distinction?

In the FreeBSD world (where I also participate), there is no such thing as an "experimental" release, such as the linux world might have. All "RELEASES" are stable, by definition. That's part of why it moves slower.

There was just an announcement of a "Developer Preview" of 5.0, which is still 6 months away most likely. It is however, kept separate from the standard releases. This is the warning that accompanied the announcement:

***************************** WARNING ********************************

This is a development snapshot, and may include serious software bugs. Do not install this on a machine where important data may be put at risk. In addition, a number of debugging options are turned on by default, so the poor performance of this snapshot should not set expectations for the final release of 5.0.

I think this is pretty clear as to what is intended for this release. I err not on the side of stasis, but on the side of deliberate progress. I was attracted to Python because its design was more deliberate, and its development more controlled than Perl.

As Guido has pointed out, we can not give definite dates, just as the FreeBSD group can not (and recently had to push out 1 YEAR the release of 5.0). However, we could set "expected" dates, and perhaps "goals" for the release. At that point, people might be able to chart the waters better. As long as we keep those milestones in mind and publicly available, I think we are doing the best any open source organization can to meet the requirements of such a diverse populace.

Chris