Judging by the number of new threads about development for 9.2, I
think its time we declared 9.1 Beta. I just had a conversation with
some Debian developers about how PostgreSQL 9.0 got pulled out of
their release because we delayed by 3 weeks. So we missed our slot to
deliver useful new features to our very best supporters by 2 years. I
really hope that was deliberate.
I've never understood why we timebox useful development, yet tweaking
is allowed to go on without limit. Personally, I don't see the
rationale to allow developers some kind of priority over their input.
This tweaking period is essentially a time when insiders can put their
votes in, but nobody else can. Beta is where we get feedback from a
wider audience.
The sooner we declare Beta, the sooner people will test. Then we will
have user feedback, bugs to fix etc.. Everybody is very clearly
sitting idle. With a longer bug list we will make faster progress to
release. We're just wasting time.
If we had a hard date for feature freeze, lets have a hard date for
Beta of +2 months (next time), and +2.5 months now. (I know +1 month
was suggested, well that's just unrealistic). Beta is a great time to
resolve difficult decisions, by opening the floor to wider debate and
feedback. Delaying beta because we still have unresolved issues is
exactly backwards of what we should be doing. Let's hear from a wider
audience.
Vox populi, vox dei
--
Simon Riggs http://www.2ndQuadrant.com/
PostgreSQL Development, 24x7 Support, Training & Services