Re: gok string freeze breakage

[Christian Rose <menthos gnome org>]

ons 2003-10-01 klockan 13.20 skrev Bill Haneman:
> > There has been an unannounced string freeze breakage in the
> > string frozen gok HEAD branch.
> 
> I didn't think string additions after the 2.4.0 release cycle 
> constituted freeze breakage (until the additional 2.4.1 freezes begin).
> 
> I did check developer.gnome.org and gtp pages but the policy you seem to
> be referring to is not documented.

Ok, trying to reply to both your mails in one.

I think a certain amount of common sense is applicable in these cases.
The fact that 2.4.0 has been released doesn't mean that all freezes are
suddenly lifted from the stable branch. What would then the point be in
having a stable branch?

Also, a good rule of thumb is probably to ask before doing any change
that could affect any potential freeze if one is unsure about whether
the freeze is still in effect, and assume it's still in effect
otherwise, unless explicitly stated as lifted from the stable branch.
The whole point of branching after all is to "leave the freezes" on the
branches and continue on with anything else on HEAD, so it's a pretty
sure bet in general to assume a branch is frozen. And if you don't have
a branch, as a direct consequence HEAD is frozen.

It's certainly true however that the status of the freezes post-.0 is
badly documented on the web pages. But the question of the status of the
freezes has already been asked and answered post-.0:

http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2003-September/msg00384.html
http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2003-September/msg00392.html
http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2003-September/msg00405.html
http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2003-September/msg00406.html

Judging from these answers, we're still in UI freeze, and traditionally,
UI freeze and string freeze have been closely related. From Jeff's mail,
however, it seems you have green light for fixing bugs that are of the
"previously used message that wasn't gettextified" kind and typos.
However, you still need to notify the translators. That didn't happen in
this case; translators weren't told anything at all.

Also, new features and new strings are banned. Judging from the diff in
this case, many new strings were added, and it's not immediately clear
that they would be a simple bug fix.

So to me, it was a pretty clear-cut case. Im sorry if you feel offended
by the boilerplate freeze breakage mail, but I'm a strong believer in
being fair and treating everyone by the same standards.

That being said, thanks for reverting these messages for now.


Christian