Re: Periodical releases

[Carsten Mattner <carstenmattner@googlemail.com>]

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On Monday, January 2, 2012, Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com> wrote:
>> > But in no case should that difficulty/nuisance of building
>> > be an excuse for releasing the product before it is fully baked.
>>
>> I don't mind building my emacs.
>
> Great.  But you did cite "less of a need to build emacs manually" as an
argument
> why releases should be more frequent.

So that distros don't carry ancient emacs versions.

>> It's a nuisance to have years old Emacs version in distributions.
>
> Why?  What's the nuisance?  Anyway, you build Emacs yourself from trunk
as often
> as you like, and you don't mind doing so.  Where's the beef?

I'd like to use the packaged emacs if it wasn't too old (for me).

>> To get a less buggy Emacs a better approach is releasing it
>> more often so that there are more testers who wouldn't even consider
>> building manually or install a prebuilt snapshot from trunk.
>
> Bon sang mais c'est bien sur!  Ye olde cathedrale vs bazaar song...
>
> There are already plenty of pre-release bugs reported, needing to be
fixed.
> Maybe when they are fixed you can argue that Emacs should be released to
get
> more testers.  For now, there seem to be enough people using pre-release
builds
> that give rise to bug reports.  More input is always welcome of course,
but
> Emacs users are not _only_ testers and fixers.

Not much to argue here.

> FWIW, where I work the default, prebuilt Emacs for developers on
GNU/Linux is
> Emacs 21.3.1!  And my impression is that few of them bother to build a
more
> recent version.  They are seemingly not clamouring for a new version,
especially
> since there are already 6 (!) releases available more recent than the one
they
> use.  (Some of them still use XEmacs, and apparently happily so.)
>
> It's sometimes good to step back a bit and imagine that not all, or even
most,
> Emacs users are involved in, or even interested in, Emacs development.
> Ponder...  Hard to fathom, I know.
>
> Many, probably most, users use Emacs the way I use my car: just to get
around
> and do the things I need to do.  I don't work on the engine; I don't want
to
> understand the electrical system; and I upgrade only when the old horse
just
> can't make it around the block anymore even with a little coaxing.
>
> Now I'm sure carmakers do not consider me their prime marketing target,
and I'm
> perhaps not a typical car owner.  But they really do need to sell new
cars, to
> stay in business.  They need new models each year - periodic releases.
>
> We're not selling cars, and we're not even in business.  We're not in a
race or
> a competition for market share.  We cannot go out of business.  We
improve Emacs
> only because we want it to be better or we enjoy improving it or both -
> intrinsic reward.  And there's no hurry in that.

If we sold cars, looks would b more important than function. It's good this
ain't a car.

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