[phpslash-users] General status of phpslash (sorta long)

[nathan r. h. <na...@ds...>]

Hey folks,

Just though I'd post a little note about the status of phpslash, seeing as
we haven't had a release in a while :)

Current:
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Just in case you've been under a rock at the bottom of a frozen lake, the
phpslash.org website is now running 0.65.  Thanks and love to Joe Stewart
and Trollboy for getting this going.  It looks darn snazzy, Thanks Guys!

If you have a phpslash site, please use the submit link at the top to send
us a blurb about it!  Also if you have a story (hint, trick, tip,
case study, rant, questions) about phpslash or php or just something
cool send it to the site!

Joe, Trollboy and me occasionally have been hanging out on IRC in
#phpslash on dal.net.  Stop by sometime (normally during the day)  and see
if someone's home and say "Hi."  Maybe if we get anough people, we'll have
a "Bug Day" or something.

Some of you have been tracking chnages in the phpslash-ft, if you do an
update you notice pretty much every damn file has changed.  This is the
result of me going though the codebase and quoting all the unquoted
strings.  Using phpslash with error_reporting=E_ALL should be a bit easier
now.  This has been an effort to get ready for the inevitable
error_reporting=Off issues.

In the future, please make sure you quote your strings; single quotes if
possible and use double quotes only when needed.  If you see places where
double quotes are being used but single quotes can be, be a nice person
and clean up the bit of code you're working on while you're at it.  I did
not quote things inside db queries, as that's a major hassle, and since
everything will change in 0.7, i figured we could deal for now.  If this
sort of thing keeps you up at night, please feel free to send in a patch
to fix it :)

I'll be releasing a 0.65-pre1 later this week.  I was going to do it
today, but seeing as I just changed every file in CVS I wanna wait a few
days to see if I opened up any lingering bugs.  Consider the current
codebase closed for feature addtions.  If you're tracking cvs or have
issues with 0.62, please file bugs NOW or they will not be addressed till
the next release.  Hoping to get 0.65 to be -final by the end of Feburary.
IF you have been working with the -ft CVS base and have documentation
issues, hints, tricks etc please send in a bug about it so we can add it
to the docs. (and yes, I just added a doc group in the bug tracker :)

Future:
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After 0.65 gets finalized any everyone is happy a few major things will be
taking place.  Remember this is later, not now, please bee patient with us
:)

- We will re-open the roadmap to feature requests.  For those of you who
  don't know, this is where I throw the curent roadmap out the window and
  let y'all pick and choose the the new features and then work backward to
  create a managable roadmap.

  If you'd like to get started now, send  stuff to the SF FEATURE REQUEST
  TRACKER (not bugs).  If something is posted and you like it, chimne in
  with a "me too!" in the tracker.  When discussion time opens, we'll
  start with the things in the feature tracker.

- phpSlash will move from a numbered release cycle to a milestone release
  cycle.  Hopefully this will allow us to make smaller number of changes
  between releases and have faster release cycles.  0.6 and 0.65 have been
  fairly long in the release department becasue we end up having to
  redesign and rebuild a major set of components + feature creep,
  hopefully between the  new milestone cycle and the general better
  overall shape of the code, we can quicken things up for y'all.

- Future versions past 0.65 will completly drop support for php3.
  You have now been offically warned.

- Future Milestones will have a tasklist assigned to them in the SF task
  manager, which I just reactivated and will populate after the 0.65
  release.  This should help folks get more involved with milestones by
  letting them know where they can help.

So, yes, we're not dead, just reallllllly damn slow :)  As always, you too
can help just by sending in a bug report, making a suggestions, or posting
a bit of documentation.  Patches always gleefully accepted.

-n
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nathan hruby
na...@ds...
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