Roadmaps 'n all that

[ hijacking this thread over to where the developers hang out ]

Alvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com> writes:
> Tom Lane wrote:
>> It's pointless to suppose that individual developers would really be
>> answerable to any project-wide management, since that's not who they're
>> paid by. So I tend to think that a project roadmap would be more of an
>> exercise in wishful thinking than a useful management tool. OTOH it
>> *could* be useful, if there are any developers out there wondering what
>> they should work on next. Are there any ... and would they listen to a
>> roadmap if they had one, rather than scratching their own itches?

> I would certainly listen to a roadmap if it talked to me ...

Well, this question keeps coming up, and we keep arguing about it, and
we still have no data to say whether it would work well for *this*
project. Maybe it's time to take the bull by the horns.

I propose a modest experiment: for the 8.3 development cycle, let's try
to agree (in the next month or so) on a roadmap of what major features
should be in 8.3 and who will make each one happen. A year from now,
we will know whether this is a great thing we should continue, or we
should stick to our traditional laissez-faire style of project
management. I figure that even if it really sucks, it wouldn't kill us
to try it for one release cycle --- at the very worst, we'd make up lost
time in future by no longer needing to waste bandwidth arguing about it.

regards, tom lane