[sldev] Timing of source releases (Re: Sources for WindLightv1.19.0.79674 ?)

[Scott Squires]

On Thu, 14 Feb 2008 09:47:30 -0500, Mike Monkowski
<monkowsk at watson.ibm.com> wrote:
> I can understand why LL may want snapshots of their development, but I
> don't see how it helps open source developers.  For open source, you
> need a solid shared reference.  The RC branch is the obvious place
> because that is the latest code that residents can run, but sometimes
> the FL branch or stable branch is needed too.
> 
> For other branches, the only interest of the open source community that
> I see is a preview of the features.

Before the incremental svn commits, all we got were source tarballs after
releases.  We were frustrated with having a couple months of development
land in out laps with no warning.  We were in the dark as to the direction
of an upcoming version and had to deal with sudden changes at the time of
release.  So now we have more information than ever, and yet more whining. 
Snapshot commits to svn are a forward direction.  We have a clearer view of
Linden development than we have ever had, in an easier format to merge with
our own code than we have ever had, and now we have people saying we should
go backwards to when we only got code at releases.

Honestly I am surprised to find myself in the position of defending Linden
Lab.  But this is just ridiculous.  There is still much to improve in the
Lab's relationship with the open source community, but unless they are
expressed constructively, these criticisms are doing more harm than good.

Now returning to lurk-dom,
--Scott