And idea about a release date?

[Heki]

I've been looking around, and I'm very surprised that I found no posts at all about a release date for 2.0 :O

My question is when do you expect 2.0 to be available to the masses? If you can be specific enough to maybe set a month like February next year or something, or just spring 2008 A date would be awesome, but I'm aware that that is not possible yet.

[AdrenalineRider]

Sorry Heki, right now the developers are working on refining the new 2.0 and make bug free before they launch it, after all our smf is by far the best forum when compared, we get the best from our friends here so ... better late than bugged ...

[Heki]

Yes, ofcourse drenalineRider. I was just being curious and wanted to have a sort of an idea about when it was roughly expected to be street-ready. I appreciate SMF a lot. It's a very nice piece of software. I would hate to see a 2.0 final full of obvious bugs!

[Douglas]

Congrats, Heki, another llama died because of that question.  :/

(If you're curious about the story behind that, search, it's been covered a few times)

[AdrenalineRider]

Congrats, Heki, another llama died because of that question.  :/

(If you're curious about the story behind that, search, it's been covered a few times)

Lolz....

[青山 素子]

There is no date for 2.0 to be final. We operate on a quality-based development cycle, not a time-based one.

[Dannii]

I believe it's still one day less than eternity.

[Heki]

Okay, that's just rude. I don't want to explain myself further than what I have already done. Goodbye.

[karlbenson]

Rude? ....

I think it was well answered (and then the joke from Eld^ka)

SMF doesnt do arbitrary release dates. 

I suspect it won't be tomorrow or next week.  Probably later this year.  But thats my own personal view.  And if SMF needed extra time to make it ready, I'm sure it would be given.

[Smurfbutcher Bob]

Actually, a gross ballpark would be fine in my book... maybe last quarter 07, or "at this time it looks like second quarter 08"...

I ask, because one of my peers is moving off of a free phpbb site in the next 3 or 4 months.  And while I love SMF... I'm not going to recommend she migrate from phpbb to 1.13, invest in all of the mod and themework, only to migrate (again) to 2.0 a week later, if ya know what I mean. It'd be much better to say "Go with 1.13, and 2.0 should be ready by summer."  Or, "Go with 1.13, but don't bother investing 200 hours on mods and hand building a custom theme, because 2.0 will be out in a month and you get to do it again, from scratch."

Not a crisis at all, but it makes life easier (as I'm sure I just illustrated).

[Dannii]

They gave ballpark estimates when they announced 2.0, and they got missed. Do you really want to plan a website around another ballpark estimate that's just as likely to be missed.

[nitins60]

Definatly Within 1year

[青山 素子]

They gave ballpark estimates when they announced 2.0, and they got missed. Do you really want to plan a website around another ballpark estimate that's just as likely to be missed.

Very true. We won't be making the mistake of any kind of time estimate again. As a good example of severe mis-estimation, we just need to look at the slipping deadline on Vista. Anyone who planned their cycle around the initial dates got quite a surprise.

Definatly Within 1year

Says who?



There are likely to be at least two more betas for SMF 2.0 before an RC (based on how things went in the past), although that is not certain. The time between these is all dependent on how many bugs are found during the beta cycle and how complex they are to fix.

[Smurfbutcher Bob]

I'm not sure you all understand how such "dates" should be used. Granted, you may feel screwed either way, but... it's not exactly true.


...it's not so much the "will be released by"... as it is the "will not be released before". And you take great pains to phrase it exactly that way. 

It's a subtle difference, but it is just as valuable - and it's how things are generally done in the enterprise.  If you cannot predict when the product will be ready (the general case), you can *certainly* predict when it won't be. In doing so, I've now got an insight into the viability of the legacy.

In your example (Vista) - we quite planned our cycle around the initial Vista release date - just not in the way you fear (because your assertion is absolutely correct!)   Your example - they said product "p" should be available by xx quarter.  Fine - I then knew that at least until then, I could count on the legacy version being the primary choice.  I knew I would not be investing *anything* in the new version until then, and then some.  My usage of that date doesn't mean we plan deploy the new product at that time - it means I can guarantee that I'm sticking with the legacy at least until then.

Contra-positive, sorta. 

And the beauty of it - the *only* way you can "miss" the predicted date is if you finalize production, *early*.  And that's not big deal to me - just keep the legacy viable until the original forecasted date and it'll have no impact (as opposed the the horror you alluded to in your example, where I'd be committed to "cutting over", and miss it).  If you finalize late... there is no such thing, since the date you gave is "not before". So long as you finish *after* that date, all is well.  And once a quarter, just reevaluate the date as best you can. Generally, you'll be pushing it back - which does not contradict the previous "not before".  See?

Have a great one,
- sbb

[karlbenson]

Even if you posted that, some users would just read the date and be expecting it to be delivered on that date come what may.

Whereever possible I'm actually in favour of keeping new forthcoming releases secret until the day they are released.
No expectation
No complaints
No disappointment.

[Heki]

There are likely to be at least two more betas for SMF 2.0 before an RC (based on how things went in the past), although that is not certain. The time between these is all dependent on how many bugs are found during the beta cycle and how complex they are to fix.

See, that is very usefull information compared to "Congrats, Heki, another llama died because of that question.  :/" and "I believe it's still one day less than eternity." coming from seemingly important-to-SMF people.

"Atleast two betas before a public release" gives a pretty good idea about how long it will take since I am a system developer myself. I also realise that I should have stated my initial question in another way, cause I know that I can't answer that question myself when I develop something. You don't work with deadlines here, so that changes the release date to something that's set to 'when the majority of bugs are fixed - enough to make a stable RC' instead of 'September 26'.

Anyway, thanks for the usefull replies Motoko and Bob.

[Tristan Perry]

Heki,
I'd agree that those sorts of posts may seem a bit harsh - although this question gets asked at least 20 times per major SMF release. And that's no exaggeration. It also get answered at least 20 times per major SMF release.

Hence doing a search before asking could have saved those members from having to answer this question again.

Plus, I'm pretty sure the posts weren't meant to be offensive
Tristan

[Dannii]

It's closer to 20 times a week...

[Heki]

Maybe I'm not thinking enough about other ways people could have asked/answered to a question like the initial one I stated, maybe it's because english isn't my first language. But I can't find any other posts about release dates. I'm sorry. But why do people say something when they only have such things to say..

Anyway, thanks for the clarification Tristan.

[motumbo]

SMF doesnt do arbitrary release dates. 

Here's the deal:  the SMF developers are very "secretive" and like to drop stuff on people.  No, it is not a good idea to give an exact date in the future when it will be released.

However, there will come a time when it will be 99% finished (almost, but not completely finished).  At that point in time it would be nice if there was a little announcement that they expect (expect being the key word) that it will be released in x number of days.

If I'm planning to spend 10 hours to customize my forum, why would I waste that time now if a new version is going to come out in two weeks meaning that I would have to do it all over again?

That's what I'd like to see.

Also, perhaps a little announcement indicating the percentage of completion would be nice.  Nobody, and I mean nobody, likes being kept in the dark.

Right now, since SMF 2.0 is out to charter members, I'm thinking it will be released within 3 months.  That's just a guess, though.