[TYPO3-core] Thoughts about the 6.2 stabilizing phase

[Ernesto Baschny]

Hi fellow TYPO3 CMS contributors,

the main goal now is a "stable 6.2 release". Please let's focus on the
important stabilization! Try to follow these principles:

* No experiments.

* Do not make changes in parts that you don't fully understand.

* Do not touch areas that are the "dark side of TYPO3" without
consulting expert advise first.

* Consider the impact of the changes you make - both positive and
negative. TYPO3 CMS is a professional product and we have the
responsibility to maintain this reputation.

* Be aware of who is working on what and who are the persons of trust
and ask in certain areas. Don't step on each others toes => communicate!

* Make sure the Unit and Functional Tests work on your setup so you can
test them yourself before merging something. Do not rely only on Jenkins
and Travis!

* If you have some patch that you reviewed and consider it "stable",
take a step back and give it some time. If not 100% sure, wait a couple
of hours before merging, maybe ask some expert around for a further review.

* If you need to revert some change, please explain that to a broader
audience (i.e. through this mailing list, like Markus Klein did some
threads ago - a very valuable input to the team and a way for the whole
team to learn from mistakes).

In case of doubt, please ask the release team (Olly Hader, Steffen
Ritter, Christian Kuhn, Helmut Hummel, Benni Mack, Xavier Perseguers or
myself).

We won't be working on NEW FEATURES yet. If some of you are already
working on these or wanting to review them, keep them in your own for
later. We won't be branching off the 6.2 development in order to avoid
the extra work of backporting fixes in the current development phase.
The plan is to branch only as soon as 6.2.0 is released.

As of "New Features" for 6.2, there is no plan to add anything else. The
current state is feature complete. I mention "plan" because it might
turn out that we require certain "feature" in order to gain (i.e. API)
stability. Also improving Usability might be seen as a "Feature" but in
some cases the lack of usability is a Bug. Consult me in case of doubt!

Now let's go on with TESTING TESTING TESTING! Try it out in your own
projects, report experiences, work on improving stability by reporting
your findings.

Kind regards and happy coding!

Cheers,
Ernesto

-- 
Ernesto Baschny
TYPO3 CMS Core Developer
Release Manager TYPO3 4.5 & 6.2 LTS

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