Re: Time for a 4.0.1 bug fix release?

[Oliver Heimlich]

On 19.10.2015 18:24, rik wrote:
> On 10/19/2015 09:09 AM, Carnë Draug wrote:
>> On 19 October 2015 at 16:19, Rik <address@hidden> wrote:
>>> 10/19/15
>>>
>>> All,
>>>
>>> Version 4.0.0 was released in May, and it is now nearly November, i.e., 6
>>> months later.
>>>
>>> Using hg log -b stable -r release-4-0-0:: > stable.log
>>>
>>> There are just 74 changesets, but quite a few important fixes for
>>> segfaults, mis-calculated results, and regressions, as well as just
>>> documentation.  It would be nice to have some sort of fix for the crashes
>>> that lots of people seem to be having with OpenGL graphics, but I don't
>>> think we have an answer there so it isn't worth delaying.
>>>
>>> My vote is for a 4.0.1 bug fix release in November.
>> What should be done about the packages that go with the MXE releases?
>> Was there any consensus about what versions to use for that?  Should we:
>>
>> 1) use the exact same versions released with 4.0.0 (unfair, why don't the
>> packages get a chance for fix their issues)
>>
>> 2) the package last patch release for the version released with 4.0.0 (but
>> most OF packages don't follow core in only accepting regression fixes in
>> those patch releases)
>>
>> 3) the last release of each package (not great if we want to extend the
>> backwards compatible promise to the packages in the MXE distribution)
>>
>> Carnë
> I would use either option 1 (unfair, but people who want the latest package
> can always go get it themselves from Octave-Forge.  We are just trying to
> be nice by including a selection of the most common packages in the same
> installer as core Octave) or option 2 (Octave-Forge has its own rules and
> we don't extend the core guarantee about compatibility on to the packages).
> 
> --Rik

I find this question very difficult, because there are good reasons for
each of the options.

However, given that the bundled packages are mainly for simplification
of package installation for Windows users, and that there is no
distinction between different kind of package releases (pkg install
-forge will always install the latest release; there is no common way
how bugfix releases are handled at Octave Forge) I suggest to simply use
option 3. Also this will place the responsibility for the package
releases on the package maintainers.

Oliver