On Mon, Nov 24, 2014 at 10:46:39PM +0100, Sebastian Zartner wrote:
I'm not a (good) C++ programmer nor am I part of the Inkscape team, though I imagine several items on the current roadmap to be huge. SVG 2 support, Hardware acceleration or animation support for example sound like things that could take a long time to be fully implemented.
So as Bryce said, in order to shorten Inkscape's release cycle you should focus on just a few (smaller) features for the next release(s). All (bigger) features should be developed in parallel on their own branch and merged when they are ready. They should not block a release. Surely keeping these branches synchronized with the main branch may sometimes be quite difficult, but worth doing to keep a clear roadmap and don't let users wait too long for new versions. To do so maybe a few people could focus on these bigger things while the others work on the parts for the next release. Though that depends on the number of contributors you have, of course.
Sebastian
Hi Sebastian, yes you're exactly right re: big projects. You have a good suggestion to allow feature work to go on in parallel in separate branches. You're right that it can be a pain to keep in sync (and to attract testers), but that's a good way to allow progress to be made without risking release delays.
In the past what we've sometimes done is break a big task up into logical chunks and spread the chunks over sequential releases. Roadmaps are perfect for organizing this type of work.
So for instance, one release might implement just backend infrastructure for the feature, then the next would add basic GUI support in an experimental fashion, and the third expands to advanced functionality and general spit and polish.
SVG 2 support is actually a collection of specific features; I could easily see us chip off some of the simpler features in one release, and leave more complex features for later releases. We'll have to scope it out and see what best matches interests and implementation feasibility.
Hardware acceleration I actually think may not be terribly hard to do in terms of coding. The trouble will be more in ensuring it is performant and robust - which is going to lean more on testing, testing, testing.
Animation support really is a big thing indeed, and we've only taken baby steps at scoping the work out. Indeed "Animation" is like "Drawing" - there's many different methods and styles, each needing a somewhat different type of UI. It's not even clear if Inkscape *should* be a vector animation editor, because of the hugely different UI needs (like trying to do word processing with a spreadsheet program). Liam has been working on ideas of splitting Inkscape's core code from the user interface code; if this is done, then I could conceive of us utilizing the same backend code but have two frontends, one specialized in doing 2D drawing, the other specialized in animation work.
Sebastian, thanks again for the ideas, and I hope you hang around and help with hashing out plans.
Bryce
On 23 November 2014 at 20:49, Josh Andler <scislac@...400...> wrote:
Bryce,
Thanks for getting the discussion started on this! The list is already looking like a great place to start. I'm hoping that this can give us some good direction moving forward with the next handful of releases.
Cheers, Josh
On Sat, Nov 22, 2014 at 11:45 PM, Bryce Harrington <bryce@...961...> wrote:
With 0.91 finally coming to a wrap soon, there are many different ideas on what to focus on next. One thing we all agree on is turning the next few releases out more rapidly, 0.92 especially.
To do this, we'll need to carefully select which new features to undertake each release; the more discriminating we are, the less risk of delay we'll face in these. The less we undertake in parallel, the more quickly we can perfect what we do tackle. The more we collaborate together as a team, the better the end result will be.
The Inkscape roadmap has proven instrumental in prioritizing and organizing our effort in the past. We can to use it again to help chart our course of development for the next several releases.
http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/RoadmapI'd like to tackle this in three steps: First, brainstorm and gather ideas into a big list. Second, filter the list down to our most pressing needs. And third, prioritize that list across the next half-dozen releases.
I figure we should strive for one primary objective each release, with one secondary and perhaps a few tertiary items. Of course, as we go we'll also have some surprises, early deliveries and the like; no need to turn those away. But the idea is to focus Inkscape on what we as a project want to achieve each release.
What do you think should be listed in our Roadmap?
Bryce
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