[TYPO3-english] TYPO3 6.0 at the corner? How is it possible

[Roberto Presedo]

Hi guys,

after reading all the posts related to this topic, I try to see the
good points of this situation  … But first : what a passionate debate
!! As far as I remember, it's been a long time since the TYPO3
community had not shown such enthusiasm … And this shows one thing …
even if we all feel that TYPO3 was in a kind of "waitingOnPhoenix"
mode, many of us are still really attached to it, and even when
Phoenix will be released, leaving TYPO3 will be a long process (if
this ever happens)...

But let's talk about this "v6" story… I think that TYPO3v4
(hereinafter simply called TYPO3) is actually a great product, but
whose development is not sufficiently emphasized. We are using v4
since april 2006 (!) and we all agree that the version 4.0 and version
4.6 are technically and visually really different (two different
worlds) … and keeping using this 4.x versioning doesn't help when we
try to demonstrate that TYPO3 is an active community based CMS. Thus,
the need to highlight the updates for TYPO3 by presenting major update
is quite obvious ...

I can understand the confusion that could arise from the use of "V5",
while this appelation was previously related only to Phoenix … I'm
less convinced by the fact that clients may be confused by the missing
5.0 version (I'm pretty it's easier selling any software by saying
"We will use the latest version of TYPO3" instead of "We will use
TYPO3 v4.6.4" … but this is not important to me. IMO, there is a
simple way to hide all this "techical/developper" specs by simply
using "codenames" when it comes to talk to clients, when we want to
promote TYPO3.

Apple (and it's not the only example) does it since the beginning of
OS.X … and when they sell a computer, they say "it comes with Leopard"
not "It comes with MacOSX 10.6" … I mean, I don't want TYPO3 to be
reduced to a simple commercial item… But, what I try to explain is :
customer doesn't "need" to know which numbered version it is… It can
be TYPO3 "Whatever" … Behind this codename, we can use TYPO3 v6.0.0
without fear of "loosing" people… Here, the real challenge would be to
agree on a theme of codename (pets, danish villages, historical
figures, …) :)

Then about having a Phoenix v1.0 project (hereinafter called [some new
name]) I am a bit worried about the impact that its TYPO3's
separation can have when we'll have to move from TYPO3 to [some new
name]. Like Xavier says in his post "So, while it never was really
official, it became clear that the 5th point of the Berlin Manifesto
(ed : "Migration of content from TYPO3 v4 to TYPO3 v5 will be easily
possible") would not be met." And that's the main problem.. As part of
a web agency which main activity is building websites based on TYPO3,
we'll face a problem when we'll have to sell the "migration" from
TYPO3 to Phoenix… As this is not going to be an easy and smooth
operation, customers will be tempted to ask themselves : "Well, do I
move to Phoenix, or do I take a look to the others solutions of the
market… Because after all, this means to start everything from
scratch."

[some new name] must have his own release strategy, and as it will
grow at his own rhythm, we must separate it from TYPO3 if we still
want to work with TYPO3 and release new version with big new features.
But we must keep in mind that the migration from TYPO3 to [some new
name] must be possible and as easy as possible. This can (must) even
be a future big sponsored task. Otherwise, this situation can simply
and sadly be resumed by this sentence I've read on Twitter
"@robertlemke: For a limited transition period, there will be two
CMSes maintained by the TYPO3 community."

I hope you do not get too bored by my message, and even if this
discussion goes in all directions (sometimes way too far), it is
important, and even vital for the future of TYPO3 to have a clear
strategy that doesn't slightly kill TYPO3.

Cheers

Roberto Presedo
@rpresedo