Progress to 0.3.8 and beyond...

[MadWolf]

hi

JkDefrag is based on the standard defragmentation API by Microsoft, a system library that is included in Windows 2000, 2003, XP, Vista, and 2008. Most defragmenters are based on this API, including commercial defragmenters. Basically all JkDefrag does is send "move this file to that location" commands to the API. It does not touch the disk by itself, and is therefore extremely solid. If your disks use NTFS then you're even safe when the computer crashes in the middle of defragmenting. Nevertheless, it's still a good idea to backup before defragmenting, just like with other defragmenters, because the heavy use of the harddisk may trigger a hardware fault (disk crash), and/or overheating (disk, power supply, controller chipset, etc.).

[nute]

It is January. Is 0.3.8 anywhere near complete? What is being worked on right now?

[MadWolf]

hi
tip
do not ask when 0.x.x is going to be released it will be released when it is released

[nute]

It says on the ReactOS homepage that January is when 0.3.8 should be expected.
Now granted, it is only the 2nd or 3rd right now. Since when did it become unacceptable
to ask about the next release and how is it any better to suggest people not do so on
here?

[MadWolf]

hi
as it is only the 2nd or 3rd right now it is more likeley it is going to released in the middle of the month to the end of the month

unacceptable
to ask about the next release

imho as it is only the 2nd or 3rd right now it is better to wait and have a bit of patience before asking when 0.x.x is going to be released but asking

What is being worked on right now?

is ok

[vicmarcal]

0.3.8 pre-release hasnt been released yet to testers.After that,testers will retest all the apps to find regressions or more apps working.In case of regressions then Devs have to fix it and a new pre-release must be tested before releasing to public.So IMHO 0.3.8 release will be at the end of this month.

[Black_Fox]

It says on the ReactOS homepage that January is when 0.3.8 should be expected.

As it is said there that the "earliest projected release date [is] being January, 2009", that means it can also be released in February, March, and so on, if something goes wrong.

[Haos]

As on for what is being worked atm, see trunk svn logs.

[nute]

It is the end of January. There are 7 days left in the month, 6 in Europe. Obvious question is, is ReactOS 0.3.8 going to be late?
I know that the low level filesystem support needs to be redone, how is that coming along?

Yeah yeah yeah, don't ask this question. Here's the thing, the last newsletter was 2 weeks ago. It's hard to look at the log of commits
and determine when 0.3.8 might come out because those commits only show what has been worked on and not what needs to be
worked on before the next release.

A roadmap might help, but there isn't one anymore.

Beyond 0.3.8, when is 0.4.x most likely to come out?

[Black_Fox]

There can be subtle hints i.e. when commit includes sentences like "branch for 0.3.8 release" and similar. EDIT: Also see my post three posts above for explanation why ReactOS won't be late if not released in January.

[Z98]

First, I'm going to refer you to this excellent blog post by Raymond Chen: http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archi ... 41164.aspx

Next, I'm going to end up repeating myself. There doesn't exist a list of things that needs to be accomplished before a point release. The current methodology is about every two months, we take a look at the state of trunk. If it's relatively stable and there have been some decent progress, and that progress can be pretty much anywhere, we prepare a release. If not, we hold off. Thus there doesn't exist an answer to your question, since we do not schedule releases based on some list of accomplishments. As such, it goes without saying that looking at the commit log tells you next to nothing about when a release will come, though the level of frustration in the commit messages is an indicator of whether trunk is stable enough to attempt a release.

[Ged]

hehe, I also like this one http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archi ... 06139.aspx

[cmoibenlepro]

Why don't you remove the "with an earliest projected release date being January, 2009. " from the frontpage? It only confuses people, and you miss the deadline everytime anyway (it is not a critic btw, I prefer a stable release with new interesting features, and also I can check the SVN if I'm impatient...)

If you do not want comments like "OMG! Why is 0.3.8 late? It's supposed to be in January! Only 5 days left! OMG!", then try to manage expectations.

[Z98]

I believe this was the way it was in the past. The only thing that's changed with adding the month is people that used to ask us when a release was coming out now ask us if the release will be late. Different phrasing, same result.

[cmoibenlepro]

Then use a date much further in the future (e.g. May 09), so no questions would be asked.