Release Process

[Biju Chacko]

This is the kind of timeline that I feel would be ideal:

Sep 27: pre1
Oct 11: pre2
Oct 25: pre3
Nov  1: 4.2
.
.
.
Dec  20: 4.4pre1
Jan  03: 4.4pre2
Jan  17: 4.4pre3
Jan  31: 4.4

A new stable release every 3 months would be very difficult unless we 
have a clear change in mindset. We need to reduce the importance of each 
stable release. Hence there is no need to cram all the new features into 
  the next release. Cool stuff like the compositor can be postponed 
safely, since we *know* that it would be released in three months. 
Feature additions could be planned to meet a specific release. If, for 
example, Jasper wants to widget-ize the panel and he feels that it 
cannot be managed in the 3 month gap between 4.2 and 4.4 he could carry 
forward the previous stable version and release the widgetized version 
in 4.6.

The exact timeline can be open to debate, but I think we need more 
structure in our release process.

What do you think?

-- b