Re: Xen 4.16: Proposed release manager and schedule

[Ian Jackson <iwj@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jan Beulich writes ("Re: Xen 4.16: Proposed release manager and schedule"):
> On 18.08.2021 17:09, Ian Jackson wrote:
> > ** DRAFT **
> > 
> >   Friday 17th September                 Last posting date
> > 
> >     Patches adding new features should be posted to the mailing list
> >     by this cate, although perhaps not in their final version.
> >     (3 weeks)
> 
> Without meaning this to express any opposition to the proposed schedule,
> I'd like to point out that as of mid July there's been unusually little
> changes getting committed. The above leaves less than a month (plus the
> 3 weeks of until feature freeze); at the present rate this would mean
> about no further (larger) changes.

Thanks for your reply.  I recognise the problems you describe.
>From my pov as (putative) RM it is difficult to see what could
constructively be done about this situation.

One option is to slip the whole release, in the expectation (hope!) of
collecting more input.  In practical terms because of the impact of
Christmas and New Year on many of our contributors, a month's slip now
is probably more like two months' slip to the release.  So arguably
for this to be worth it, we ought to plan to slip 2 months now and
release in February.

Some of the thinness of this release in particular relates to an
unusual combination of substantial leave taken by many key
contributors, so maybe this is a thing we should consider.
Even my proposing this schedule was rather late, in part for those
reasons.

I don't personally have a strong opinion about the right decision.
But if we are intending to release in December, I think something like
my proposed schedule is probably about right.  Perhaps it could be
compressed a bit due to the lack of major contributions so far.

I would love to hear other opinions.

Ian.