Robert Treat wrote:
>On Tuesday 21 March 2006 18:59, satoshi nagayasu wrote:
>
>
>>Tom Lane wrote:
>>
>>
>>>In particular, asking for a list of features that will be done in
>>>particular future releases shows a complete lack of understanding
>>>of the process ...
>>>
>>>
>>I completely understand.
>>
>>However, we also need to know why business people want
>>to know about the future plan. For the business people,
>>the roadmap is used to know the software is fit to
>>their (growing) business, not only now but in the future.
>>
>>Roadmap can be changed, but still roadmap is necessary
>>for some kind of users.
>>
>>
>>
>
>I guess we need all talks like this to have a special slide that points out
>that if someone doesn't see the feature they need on the list, they can have
>it in the next version as long as they're willing to put some resources
>behind it. :-)
>
>
>
But it isn't true. Patches get rejected. We won't just automatically
adopt someone's idea if a cool new feature.
My idea of a roadmap would indicate a set of features that had at least
in principle general acceptance and which somebody had undertaken to try
to deliver. Unfortunately, Our TODO list doesn't necessarily meet either
of these criteria. It could also be extended to include some sort of
prioritisation, e.g. "really really want to have", "would like to have",
"would be nice if we can get it in".
The roadmap would be indicative, not prescriptive, i.e. nothing would
stop somebody from delivering a patch for some cool new feature, and
having it considered. And the absence of some feature would not
necessarily inhibit a release. But it would be nice to have some
document that indicated what was likely to be coming down the track
(e.g. I didn't realise that Jonah was going to be doing hierarchical
queries, which will be a very cool thing to have indeed, and one which
many users will drool over.)
cheers
andrew