[cdwg] Lustre maintenance releases

[Cory Spitz]

Hi, Chris.  My responses are snipped below.

On 07/24/2012 05:10 PM, Christopher J. Morrone wrote:
> 
> I think that 2.4.0 at the end of March 2013 should be considered the
> first maintenance release on the maintenance branch, not 2.4.1.

OK.  Technically, by the current model, 2.4.0 is a "feature release".  I
agree that it would be the first release along the b2_4 maintenance branch.

> 
> I would also argue that minor point releases should come as-needed
> instead of every three months, especially at the beginning of the
> branch's life.  We may have 4 point releases in the first 3 months.

I agree that we want to introduce some flexibility.  By WC's current
model, the release branches are tentatively scheduled quarterly.

> I'm not sure if it is or not.  You seem to be combining all development,
> features, bug fixes, etc., into a single "maintenance stream".  Maybe
> that isn't what you meant to imply, but I think that would be quite
> different than what I was suggesting.  In the model I write about,
> maintenance branches progress in parallel with each other and with the
> development branch.

That's not exactly what I was implying.  I was not trying to close the
door completely on parallel maintenance branches.  But, I think that we
should make it clear that people are encouraged to move to the next
stable maintenance branch once it is created.  That is, we should not
plan for more 2.1.x releases after b2_4 is created.  We should however
leave the door open (just a crack) to allow us to fix anything egregious
on the older release branches.  I think it would be too much effort to
keep multiple maintenance branches 'alive'.

> 
> But if I read the picture another way, assuming that the 2.1 and 2.3
> don't dead-end, then I think you've just got too many maintenance
> branches.  I don't think we really have the resources to have three
> active maintenance branches (2.1, 2.3, and 2.4) at the same time.
> 

Agreed as stated above.  That's why I think that we should be very clear
about EOL for 2.3.1 if it were to exist.  It would be very short lived;
just until 2.4 was available.

Thanks,
-Cory