Getting a move on for 8.2 beta

(I've already bounced this off the core committee, but it's time for
wider discussion.)

September is upon us and it doesn't seem like we are ready to ship
a beta. I think it's time to start making some hard choices.

In the main code I see these outstanding features/patches:

* bitmap indexes
* updatable views
* GUC variable reload + refactoring (previously applied and reverted)
* plpython improvements (needs review by someone who knows plpython)
* plpgsql improvements for returning record types
* patch to build on VC
* make libpq default client_encoding setting from locale?

In contrib we've got:

* new ISBN/etc module
* hstore (finally proposed for inclusion)
* new sslinfo module
* pgstattuple changes
* removing the deadwood

These are not all the open issues, for sure, but these are what I think
have to be resolved before we can go beta. Everything else is in the
category of "bug fixes", and none of it seems like a showstopper (in
fact a lot of the small stuff on my todo list is bugs reported against
8.1, so those certainly are not beta-stoppers).

My feeling is that we ought to bounce bitmap indexes and updatable views
as not being ready, accept all the contrib stuff, and try to get the
other items done in time for a beta at, say, the end of next week.

I'm not thrilled about postponing those two large items till 8.3, but
we are a month past feature freeze and we do not have credible patches
in hand for either. The alternative is to be willing to slip the
schedule until whenever they are ready, and we have learned the hard way
that that's not good project management.

Comments?

regards, tom lane