[Gwt-openlayers-devl] The road towards 0.4rc1

[Edwin C. <com...@gm...>]

Hi all,

Over the past few days I created a new Tracker on the GWT-OpenLayers plugin
website called 'Milestone issues'. The intention behind this tracker is to
assign issues to versions of GWT-OpenLayers. I saw that Curtis already
commented on issues I added to the tracker. Thanks for that Curtis and great
that you implemented the Framed Cloud and helped out on the KML!

Issues can only be added to the Tracker 'Milestone issues' by developers.
That way the milestone issues won't get clogged with non- issues. users can
submit bugs and feature requests in the public Trackers, and we can evaluate
these issues, categorize them and then decide whether and how to add these
to the Milestone issues.

The categories I have for the Milestone issues are now:
-Functionality
-Documentation
-General
-Showcase

For milestone issues regarding functionality it would be convenient if the
functionality is at a detailed level (about 1 OpenLayers classs) and if it
is prefaced with the OL category, for example:
Format:WMC read/write,  Format:GML read/write,  Control:DragFeature

Please submit any of the features that you want to have in OpenLayers 0.4
first release candidate, so we can work towards a new release of
GWT-OpenLayers.

My suggestion is to compile a list of features that we want to wrap (or
maybe extend upon) in GWT-OpenLayers, see what can be achieved on reasonable
timescale and implement that.

Just before releasing GWT-OpenLayers 0.4 rc1  we could do a rename of the
package (see Milestone issues>General) and possible move to a new VCS.

I saw that Mapbuilder (now end-of-life) shipped with OpenLayers already
included, so it is probably legally possible to ship OpenLayers with
GWT-OpenLayers and maybe it is desirable for us to do this with 0.4 rc1. The
GWT-OpenLayers module xml could reference the script (just as it does with
the util script).

Another thing I have been looking into is testcases. With GWT 1.5 it is
possible to have a TestSuite which can invoke a whole range of GWTTestCase
testcases. Next to the package name, VCS, and OpenLayers inclusion, I think
it's wise to decide if GWT-OpenLayers shoulde remain GWT 1.4 compatible or
that we want to upgrade to 1.5 opening up possibilitys for using Enums and
Generics.

With respect to documentation I feel that most documentation should be on
the wiki provided by SF and the website can provide links to that wiki.

Concluding things, I would appreciate it if people started filling the
milestone issues tracker, so we can work towards a new release of
GWT-OpenLayers. I was thinking to strive for a new release in april, because
the trunk already includes a lot of functionality up and above the 0.2
release (thanks again Erdem for 0.2!). The reason to go for 0.4 and skip 0.3
is to reflect that we really moved forward. Personally I like official
releases to be x.y and not x.y.z or x.y.z.a, how about you?

Greetings,
Edwin Commandeur

P.S. Gev, I finally found out that OpenStreetMap provides a js file
alongside OpenLayers at "
http://openstreetmap.org/openlayers/OpenStreetMap.js". If this is not just
used under water by OpenLayers but contains additionaly functionality, then
it is interesting to wrap.