The Road to Dapper

[Mark Shuttleworth]

As of today the archive for development of the next release of Ubuntu
is open. Here are some pointers to information about the goals we have
set for Dapper, the roadmap, the process we are following to identify
and specify features, and the tools we will be using to coordinate and
deliver The Drake.

We are preparing for our Montreal Developer Summit, which takes place
<http://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBelowZero> in Montreal, Canada next week,
and where the final list of features and release schedule will be
decided. If you would like to participate in that discussion, please
read the documents attached to this mail, or the newest versions on the
web at the URL's given, and make sure that you contribute your feature
specifications and suggestions. Don't mail them to me - capture them on
the wiki and in Launchpad.net so that the entire community can
participate in shaping them, prioritising and implementing them.

Most of these are pages on the web site, or on the wiki. I have attached
copies of them to this message and will summarise them below, so that
offline readers have them handy.

   1. *High Level Dapper Goals: *We have a statement on the high-level
      goals of Dapper at http://wiki.ubuntu.com/DapperGoals (attached). 
      In summary: we aim for this to be an extremely *polished* release,
      on both the desktop and the server. While we will ship the latest
      Gnome and KDE environments, as usual, we will put extra effort into
      polishing those to ensure the smoothest possible end-user
      experience. We will also make server stability and deployment of a
      new server-oriented Ubuntu derivative a high level goal for the first
      time.

   2. *Planning for Ubuntu Below Zero*. The best place to start is the
      FeatureSpecifications page in the Ubuntu wiki at
      http://wiki.ubuntu.com/FeatureSpecifications (also attached). This
      describes the process of creating a good feature specification,
      registering it with Launchpad and putting it on the UBZ agenda.
      *Please register all UBZ specs by 27 October*. The team will
      triage and prioritise specs between the 27th and Ubuntu Love Day
      on the 30th in Montreal.

   3. We have a proposal on *changes to the standard Release Schedule*. 
      As Jdub put it, "We want Dapper to be different, so we'll have to
      think differently about the release". This proposal will be
      discussed further at UBZ and finalized by the end of the
      conference, what you'll find on the DapperReleaseSchedule page at
      http://wiki.ubuntu.com/DapperReleaseSchedule is a current
      suggestion, comments welcome.

   4. Final decisions on the plan for Dapper features and priorities
      will be taken during UBZ, and published through the wiki on a
      spec-by-spec basis. I really encourage **everybody to participate**
      through the wiki as we polish the final list. You can see the
      actual specs being discussed at https://launchpad.net/sprints/ubz
      (again, a copy of the current version of that page is attached but
      it is changing rapidly at the moment as we finalise the agenda
      so make sure your own key requirements are suggested before the
      deadline of the 27th).

Breezy has had a wonderful reception out in the wild. That was in large
part thanks to the sheer number of people who chipped in a little bit of
sparkle... You all made Breezy a gem. Every time I get mail from someone
doing something amazing with Breezy my "Breezy ROCKS" counter gets a
bump, and I get even more motivated to build a truly free distribution
that I can share with pride and confidence. So I'm really excited about
this roadmap. The Drake will take the world by storm.

Be bold. Be professional. Be Dapper.
Mark


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-users/attachments/20051024/84f494af/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-users/attachments/20051024/84f494af/attachment-0001.html>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-users/attachments/20051024/84f494af/attachment-0002.html>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-users/attachments/20051024/84f494af/attachment-0003.html>