Perceived lack of development information

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

I’ve been using SUSE for about a decade or so (since the 7.x branch) and I’ve recently tried to become more involved in the development process by using the milestones and betas and reporting bugs. However, I keep finding the lack of information available on the development process lacking. Here’s what I’ve noticed:

-The developer download page (software.opensuse.org: Download openSUSE 12.1 Milestone 3) offers no roadmap, no release date (for the milestone), and no release notes. The release notes link goes to 11.4, not the milestone. It’s hard to know what to test if the information isn’t immediately available.
-The roadmap page (openSUSE:Roadmap - openSUSE) says that milestone 4 should have been out on August 11th, but that it was delayed. There’s no information as to why it was delayed and if/when it will become available.
-The roadmap page links to the detailed roapmap page (openSUSE 12.1 timeline) where it still says that milestone 4 will be out Aug. 11th, with no mention of a delay.
-The detailed roadmap page links to a discussion page for milestone 4 (OpenSUSE release cycle/openSUSE 12.1 Milestone 4 Release - SIMILE Shelf) which is empty.
-To get to this forum, which seems to have the most information, you have to click “Support” then “Forums”, even though support isn’t what I’m looking for. And then this forum is in the “technical help” category, which again isn’t what I’m looking for.

Unless I’m missing something, there seems to be a real lack of updated information available. I would suggest that a developer make a public webpage listing what the targets are for the next release (i.e., kernel 3.0, new YaST, etc) and some release notes for each milestone. Keep the roadmap up-to-date and maybe even setup an email notification of the availability for new development releases.

#2

Hi
You need to either join the Factory mailing list to see what is
happening or keep an eye on the archive;
http://en.opensuse.org/Communicate
http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-factory/

You can see the testing here;
http://openqa.opensuse.org/results/?hours=96&match=DVD

–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 11.4 (x86_64) Kernel 2.6.37.6-0.7-desktop
up 23:39, 3 users, load average: 0.06, 0.14, 0.12
GPU GeForce 8600 GTS Silent - Driver Version: 280.13

#3

Hi there,

This was one that “got away” from us. Vacations and conferences and things. There was NOT an “official” 12.1 M4 release. However, it was stated that you could do a ‘zypper dup’ and get the latest. This was mentioned by oldcpu at:
Question: openSUSE-12.1 Milestone-4 planned replacement is a repository update ?

However, the latest news is that there will be a 12.1 M5 and it will be on time!! The map:
Tue, May 31 2011, M1 … On Time
Wed, Jun 22 2011, M2 … On Time
Tue, Jul 19 2011, M3 … it was late
Thu, Aug 11 2011, M4 … just a Repository
Thu, Sep 01 2011, M5
Thu, Sep 22 2011, M6
Thu, Oct 13 2011, RC 1
Fri, Oct 27 2011, RC 2
Thu, Nov 03 2011, Goldmaster
Thu, Nov 10 2011, PublicRelease

This is, after all, a volunteer effort. Once in a while the volunteers get otherwise occupied… family, work, illness etc…
Take care and keep looking … they’re coming.
Chuck

#4

Hi,

I know you guys do a fantastic job, and neither I, nor the initial poster mean you any disrespect. I am a happy user since I bought the 6.4 version for PPC in 2000.

But please, the suggestions are imminently useful. There must be some kind of middle way between subscribing to a mailing list and clicking around desperately on the web page.

Just a a link to a wiki with the information that the initial poster asked for on the roadmap page would do the trick.

Thanks for the best linux distribution.