[daniel at freedesktop.org: Timeline, and slippage]

[Carl Worth]

On Fri, 30 Jul 2004 15:25:48 -0400, Owen Taylor wrote:
> So I don't see any duplication, much less massive duplication between
> the specification and platform releases. They will be coordinated
> as appropriate, they don't need to be the same.

Owen,

I agree that the nature of the products and the release criteria are
different for software and specifications. But I do see a lot of
similarity between the release process. For example, the ways in which
release managers interact with those doing the work is largely the same.

And there are other good reasons to share things as much as possible
between these efforts. I don't anticipate a surfeit of release-manager
time that it makes sense to have independent processes.

Another aspect that might be important is to reduce confusion between
what "products" it is that freedesktop.org is producing.

So that brings up issues such as naming, versioning, and release
timing. The interaction between software and specification leads to
interesting questions. Should software supporting a specification always
be released simultaneously? Should the two products be released at the
same frequency but with a phase difference?

I think it is important that the answers to these issues be decided
jointly for the software and specification efforts.

Maybe all I'm saying is, "Yes, these efforts need to be coordinated as
appropriate. Let's decide now what that means."

-Carl