[Bf-committers] Sunday meeting notes, sept 20 2009

[Ton Roosendaal]

Hi all,

**** 2.5 scheduling

Meeting went over the previously proposed roadmap, for completeness I 
repeat all information here, but updated to reflect the meeting 
feedback.

A rough big picture for the next 11 months you find in this schedule:
http://www.blender.org/bf/2009-planning.png

Some notes to understand the basics behind the proposed schedule:

Durian lasts either 6.5 or 9 months... we only know this early 
november. It means that some of our film development targets can shift 
a bit.

I've split the development targets basically in these milestones:

2.5 beta 0: Get back at least what worked in 2.4x
         (with agreed exceptions, like some py im/export scripts)

2.5 beta 1: Wrap up what's minimal required for 2.5
         (Make a feasible pick of all things we need now, and what to do 
later.)

This then should be the (first) version usable for docs or books.

All of the other new development projects (bmesh, render, etc) move to 
after this deadline, which we define in three intermediate release 
steps, for example:

2.5 beta 2: BMesh, modeling projects

2.5 beta 3: Animation features

2.5 beta 4: Render/composite features

Which (not coincidentally!) aligns with the durian project anyway. To 
celebrate a succesful Durian film we can then move to a 2.6 version in 
the summer after, which also should wrap up and complete all 2.5 
projects and expectations.

Meeting agreed on officially make this a "2.5 series of beta releases". 
We also will work out a more faster way to number versions, for example 
to end this 2.5 beta series with a stable 2.6.

We also accepted to do more releases (official builds) this year... 
feasible should be three or four per year.

This schedule is still a topic for discussion on the bf-committers 
list, my aim is to try to get a good generic consensus on it. I'll also 
need to know all the other developer targets and predictions... like 
for the game engine, dynamics, video, sound, etc etc.

**** 2.5 projects

These GSoC branches will now move to 2.5 trunk soon:
- Collada
- Python im/exporters
- Raytrace optimize
- OpenGL drawing optimize (VBO)

Benoit reports good progress on his new IK module.

William will work on an updated list of 2.5 UI todos, and check with 
Ton on a good planning to spread targets over the various beta 
milestones.

We will need 2.5 beta splashes! Proposed layout for splash screen:
http://www.reynish.com/files/blender25/welcomescreen_3.png
As usual we'll involve blenderartists.org forum for submitting artwork; 
the previous three judges should each appoint another judge and inform 
me about it! Official announcement will follow.

Nathan points at his RedMine port of the Blender projects site:
http://rm.letworyinteractive.com
You can already login there, get a new password and look around. Note 
that if you used your email address twice (or more) on 
projects.blender.org, your account hasn't been ported over yet.

-Ton-

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Ton Roosendaal  Blender Foundation   ton at blender.org    www.blender.org
Blender Institute   Entrepotdok 57A  1018AD Amsterdam   The Netherlands