[DISCUSS] Setting Roadmaps for OCW Moving Forward

[Lewis John Mcgibbney <le...@gmail.com>]

Hi Folks,
I would like to kick off a very important and long overdue conversation
here on list, with anyone watching, monitoring and/or reading their OCW
mail, about how we can set more realistic, strategic roadmap's for
releasing the project software as official Apache releases.
Some thoughts on my part

   - OCW is under development and the issues which are being logged and
   addressed are valid, forward looking and


-- 
*Lewis*

Re: [DISCUSS] Setting Roadmaps for OCW Moving Forward

[Michael Joyce <jo...@apache.org>]

Re. more regular releases and a roadmap, +1 from me. It's not complicated.
We've talked about more regular releases in the past we just need to work
actively towards doing it. So let's do it!

-- Jimmy

On Thu, Sep 24, 2015 at 5:13 AM, Tom Barber <to...@meteorite.bi> wrote:

> From an outsiders point of view, this whole OCW release has made
> interesting viewing :)
>
> Hopefully you wont mind me adding my 2c, and I don't use the platform so
> this is purely hypothetical.
>
> It would seem to me that is shouldn't be too hard to dump in a bunch of
> "releases" into Jira that are quarterly or so, they dont have to be set in
> stone, just a rough guide to when the next release is due, at least this
> way releases aren't a surprise or creeping up on any body, as is the
> roadmap.
>
> As Lewis mentioned you then assign issues to releases, that list doesnt'
> have to be fixed, if something doesn't make it just bump it to the next
> release, but at least then people should have a rough idea as to what is
> coming in the next release. Outside of the ASF I'm a big fan of the Git
> Flow process to get code ready for releasing, you could easily support
> something like that in a project like this where a week or so before a
> release branch the release code and just accept bug fixes to that branch
> whilst not blocking up people who want to commit new stuff to the main
> development branch. Use the tools you have available to you!
>
> Similarly, what's in a number? Just because you've hit 1.0 doesn't mean it
> has to be feature complete, but if its major enough then call it 1. If you
> have to fix some stuff for the 1 release then call the next one 1.0.1, if
> on the other hand you add some new functionality to the code base then call
> it 1.1 and everyone should be happy. Of course if your update changes a
> load of API stuff or breaks things then call it 2! Its not hard :)
>
> Regards,
>
> Tom
>
> Available for parties, disco's, local events, build and project management.
>
> On Thu, Sep 24, 2015 at 6:58 AM, Lewis John Mcgibbney <
> lewis.mcgibbney@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > OK I sent too soon, sorry about that.
> > What I did notice is that both Shakeh Elisabeth Khudikyan and Kim
> > Whitehall's apache ID's are not correct on
> > http://climate.apache.org/community/people.html. I received bounced
> > emails.
> >
> > Anyway, back to the point
> >
> >
> >    - OCW is under development by a small number of people. I work with
> this
> >    day-in-day-out with a number of other Apache projects where the role
> of
> > the
> >    project committers and project management committee also becomes one
> > which
> >    involves being an evangelist for the project as well as a developer
> and
> >    user of the code.
> >    - The positive is that the issues which are being logged and addressed
> >    are valid, forward thinking, feature rich and certainly very positive
> > for
> >    the project as a whole.
> >    - Over the last year or so we have not doing terribly well at
> attracting
> >    new members to the OCW community who stay and commit code. I am one of
> > them
> >    and I have committed few lines of code. I do feel that this can be
> > partly
> >    attributed to the lack of evangelism done with those of us who are
> > 'around'
> >    and active should push come to shove.
> >    - We are releasing way to infrequently. Our last release was in
> January
> >    of 2015. That is 9 months between releases that, whilst not unheard
> of,
> > is
> >    less that what we should be achieving. I firmly believe that we could
> > drive
> >    more interest in the codebase if we were driving more releases,
> dealing
> >    with feedback, taking criticism and generally reaching out to more of
> > the
> >    scientific community that OCW is purposed to cater for.
> >    - It appears that we DO NOT set a road-map. Seeing as there are very
> few
> >    of us, I propose that was do this from now on. E.g. Pick 10-20 issues
> > which
> >    are major level or above (according to Jira), then work on these
> between
> >    development drives. If new issues arrive which are deemed more
> serious,
> >    then we simply evaluate and swap them out. The key here is that we
> keep
> >    development drives to a small number of issue with the purpose of
> > driving
> >    releases.
> >
> > I think that the above provides us with food for thought.
> >
> > Any comments from ANYONE on the above?
> >
> > It has also become obvious to me recently that not everyone is prepared
> or
> > able to VOTE and undertake similar project related tasks. If this is the
> > case, I would kindly ask you to consider going emeritus (or at-least
> > classifying your activity at that level on the Website). It is important
> > for us to be realistic when we can barely cover enough VOTE's for a
> release
> > when we have a >20 strong PMC. If you were to go emeritus you would,
> should
> > you wish to, become active at any stage in the future. This is not an
> > issue. I just think that we need to be realistic on what the capabilities
> > of the PMC are when those who are active on the project struggle for
> close
> > to 1 month to get a release VOTE'd on.
> >
> > Thanks very much for reading. I hope the above provides us with some
> > talking points.
> >
> > Lewis
> >
> > On Wed, Sep 23, 2015 at 10:43 PM, Lewis John Mcgibbney <
> > lewis.mcgibbney@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Hi Folks,
> > > I would like to kick off a very important and long overdue conversation
> > > here on list, with anyone watching, monitoring and/or reading their OCW
> > > mail, about how we can set more realistic, strategic roadmap's for
> > > releasing the project software as official Apache releases.
> > > Some thoughts on my part
> > >
> > >    - OCW is under development and the issues which are being logged and
> > >    addressed are valid, forward looking and
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > *Lewis*
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > *Lewis*
> >
>

Re: [DISCUSS] Setting Roadmaps for OCW Moving Forward

[Tom Barber <to...@meteorite.bi>]

>From an outsiders point of view, this whole OCW release has made
interesting viewing :)

Hopefully you wont mind me adding my 2c, and I don't use the platform so
this is purely hypothetical.

It would seem to me that is shouldn't be too hard to dump in a bunch of
"releases" into Jira that are quarterly or so, they dont have to be set in
stone, just a rough guide to when the next release is due, at least this
way releases aren't a surprise or creeping up on any body, as is the
roadmap.

As Lewis mentioned you then assign issues to releases, that list doesnt'
have to be fixed, if something doesn't make it just bump it to the next
release, but at least then people should have a rough idea as to what is
coming in the next release. Outside of the ASF I'm a big fan of the Git
Flow process to get code ready for releasing, you could easily support
something like that in a project like this where a week or so before a
release branch the release code and just accept bug fixes to that branch
whilst not blocking up people who want to commit new stuff to the main
development branch. Use the tools you have available to you!

Similarly, what's in a number? Just because you've hit 1.0 doesn't mean it
has to be feature complete, but if its major enough then call it 1. If you
have to fix some stuff for the 1 release then call the next one 1.0.1, if
on the other hand you add some new functionality to the code base then call
it 1.1 and everyone should be happy. Of course if your update changes a
load of API stuff or breaks things then call it 2! Its not hard :)

Regards,

Tom

Available for parties, disco's, local events, build and project management.

On Thu, Sep 24, 2015 at 6:58 AM, Lewis John Mcgibbney <
lewis.mcgibbney@gmail.com> wrote:

> OK I sent too soon, sorry about that.
> What I did notice is that both Shakeh Elisabeth Khudikyan and Kim
> Whitehall's apache ID's are not correct on
> http://climate.apache.org/community/people.html. I received bounced
> emails.
>
> Anyway, back to the point
>
>
>    - OCW is under development by a small number of people. I work with this
>    day-in-day-out with a number of other Apache projects where the role of
> the
>    project committers and project management committee also becomes one
> which
>    involves being an evangelist for the project as well as a developer and
>    user of the code.
>    - The positive is that the issues which are being logged and addressed
>    are valid, forward thinking, feature rich and certainly very positive
> for
>    the project as a whole.
>    - Over the last year or so we have not doing terribly well at attracting
>    new members to the OCW community who stay and commit code. I am one of
> them
>    and I have committed few lines of code. I do feel that this can be
> partly
>    attributed to the lack of evangelism done with those of us who are
> 'around'
>    and active should push come to shove.
>    - We are releasing way to infrequently. Our last release was in January
>    of 2015. That is 9 months between releases that, whilst not unheard of,
> is
>    less that what we should be achieving. I firmly believe that we could
> drive
>    more interest in the codebase if we were driving more releases, dealing
>    with feedback, taking criticism and generally reaching out to more of
> the
>    scientific community that OCW is purposed to cater for.
>    - It appears that we DO NOT set a road-map. Seeing as there are very few
>    of us, I propose that was do this from now on. E.g. Pick 10-20 issues
> which
>    are major level or above (according to Jira), then work on these between
>    development drives. If new issues arrive which are deemed more serious,
>    then we simply evaluate and swap them out. The key here is that we keep
>    development drives to a small number of issue with the purpose of
> driving
>    releases.
>
> I think that the above provides us with food for thought.
>
> Any comments from ANYONE on the above?
>
> It has also become obvious to me recently that not everyone is prepared or
> able to VOTE and undertake similar project related tasks. If this is the
> case, I would kindly ask you to consider going emeritus (or at-least
> classifying your activity at that level on the Website). It is important
> for us to be realistic when we can barely cover enough VOTE's for a release
> when we have a >20 strong PMC. If you were to go emeritus you would, should
> you wish to, become active at any stage in the future. This is not an
> issue. I just think that we need to be realistic on what the capabilities
> of the PMC are when those who are active on the project struggle for close
> to 1 month to get a release VOTE'd on.
>
> Thanks very much for reading. I hope the above provides us with some
> talking points.
>
> Lewis
>
> On Wed, Sep 23, 2015 at 10:43 PM, Lewis John Mcgibbney <
> lewis.mcgibbney@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hi Folks,
> > I would like to kick off a very important and long overdue conversation
> > here on list, with anyone watching, monitoring and/or reading their OCW
> > mail, about how we can set more realistic, strategic roadmap's for
> > releasing the project software as official Apache releases.
> > Some thoughts on my part
> >
> >    - OCW is under development and the issues which are being logged and
> >    addressed are valid, forward looking and
> >
> >
> > --
> > *Lewis*
> >
>
>
>
> --
> *Lewis*
>

Re: [DISCUSS] Setting Roadmaps for OCW Moving Forward

[Lewis John Mcgibbney <le...@gmail.com>]

OK I sent too soon, sorry about that.
What I did notice is that both Shakeh Elisabeth Khudikyan and Kim
Whitehall's apache ID's are not correct on
http://climate.apache.org/community/people.html. I received bounced emails.

Anyway, back to the point


   - OCW is under development by a small number of people. I work with this
   day-in-day-out with a number of other Apache projects where the role of the
   project committers and project management committee also becomes one which
   involves being an evangelist for the project as well as a developer and
   user of the code.
   - The positive is that the issues which are being logged and addressed
   are valid, forward thinking, feature rich and certainly very positive for
   the project as a whole.
   - Over the last year or so we have not doing terribly well at attracting
   new members to the OCW community who stay and commit code. I am one of them
   and I have committed few lines of code. I do feel that this can be partly
   attributed to the lack of evangelism done with those of us who are 'around'
   and active should push come to shove.
   - We are releasing way to infrequently. Our last release was in January
   of 2015. That is 9 months between releases that, whilst not unheard of, is
   less that what we should be achieving. I firmly believe that we could drive
   more interest in the codebase if we were driving more releases, dealing
   with feedback, taking criticism and generally reaching out to more of the
   scientific community that OCW is purposed to cater for.
   - It appears that we DO NOT set a road-map. Seeing as there are very few
   of us, I propose that was do this from now on. E.g. Pick 10-20 issues which
   are major level or above (according to Jira), then work on these between
   development drives. If new issues arrive which are deemed more serious,
   then we simply evaluate and swap them out. The key here is that we keep
   development drives to a small number of issue with the purpose of driving
   releases.

I think that the above provides us with food for thought.

Any comments from ANYONE on the above?

It has also become obvious to me recently that not everyone is prepared or
able to VOTE and undertake similar project related tasks. If this is the
case, I would kindly ask you to consider going emeritus (or at-least
classifying your activity at that level on the Website). It is important
for us to be realistic when we can barely cover enough VOTE's for a release
when we have a >20 strong PMC. If you were to go emeritus you would, should
you wish to, become active at any stage in the future. This is not an
issue. I just think that we need to be realistic on what the capabilities
of the PMC are when those who are active on the project struggle for close
to 1 month to get a release VOTE'd on.

Thanks very much for reading. I hope the above provides us with some
talking points.

Lewis

On Wed, Sep 23, 2015 at 10:43 PM, Lewis John Mcgibbney <
lewis.mcgibbney@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Folks,
> I would like to kick off a very important and long overdue conversation
> here on list, with anyone watching, monitoring and/or reading their OCW
> mail, about how we can set more realistic, strategic roadmap's for
> releasing the project software as official Apache releases.
> Some thoughts on my part
>
>    - OCW is under development and the issues which are being logged and
>    addressed are valid, forward looking and
>
>
> --
> *Lewis*
>



-- 
*Lewis*