Boy oh joy, what a thread!
It will be hard to respond to everyone's concerns without sounding defensive, but I'll try.
Where do I begin? I think it's a great idea to take you through the history of events surrounding this release, so that we can all be on the same page.
The team started development on version 03.05.00 back in May of this year.
The idea behind this release was that it would be the "last" release of the current asp.net 1.1 code-base.
Given that upgrading, which meants also re-writing some key components from scratch, is a time consuming undertaking, we planned to get as many "critical" and "most requested" features available in 03.05.00.
The blog team put in a lot of effort in making the necessary code changes to include feature to bring the module "up to speed", or "modernize" it and were really excited to get this release out the door, in the hopes of satisfying the many requests made on this very forum. MetaWebLog, enhanced SEO, Commenting, avatars, social bookmarks, etc are all exciting parts of this release.
In the first weeks of July, we were almost ready to put the module through the release tracker, when we were approached by DNN Corp.
Essentially, they had a commercial need to provide additional functionality to a "paying" client. This feature was not part of the 03.05.00 plan, but was one that was on future plans. DNN Corp offered to develop this feature and asked us if it were possible for us to "wait" a week or so before submitting it to the tracker.
I AGREED, with the caveat that we would receive the code within a specified period of time (I don't recollect the exact dates, but it was something like a week). For the record, the reason why I had a agreed was because some of the features that they intended on developing included things VERY MUCH requested by the community, such as "Multi-User" blogs. Once again, this was all in the interest of getting as many "good" features in 03.05.00 to hold us off for a bit, while we developed 04.00.00.
On July 21st, the deadline for receiving the code from DNN Corp had expired, and therefore I proceeded as planned and as agreed upon, to submitting 03.05.00 as originally envisioned to the release tracker. I also, proceeded, contrary to popular belief, in good faith, to blog about it! In fact, we were so excited about it, that we even created 3 blogs about the upcoming features prior to this announcement. This was in no way "premature" as Voice Smith points out, at the contrary, it was right on target, and the "right" thing to do. Once again, this post was done with good intentions, and in the spirit of full disclosure AND "open communication" - not vapor!
On July 22, the module failed the release tracker (see Dario's post in the thread for reasons).
On July 23, the blog module was fixed, tested, re-packaged, and re-submitted to the tracker (twice, because the first submission quickly revealed another issue).
On October 11th, the module had gone through much of the release tracker process but ended up failing again because of a wrong sql datatype (varchar, instead of nvarchar).
On October 12th, the blog module was fixed, tested, re-packaged, and re-submitted to the tracker, the module failed again for some other minor issue, and immediately fixed, tested, re-packaged, and re-submitted to the tracker.
In the mean time, DNN Corp got back to me with some good news, their project was finally complete and they were ready to merge the code.
Once again, I AGREED to do the merge, but again, with the caveat that the Blog module would have to fail tracker for me to even consider a merge in this release. Shortly thereafter, another minor fault was found with blog module.
At this point it was time to get to work but as we prepared roll up our sleeves we ran into scheduling and communication issues.
While I am not in a position to share with you the several emails that were traded back and forth, I believe you can trust that both I and the blog team members have done everything in our power to get this done, we simply were not successful at it.
At this point, it's September, things slowed down even more as the broader team geared up for OpenForce EU. Preparations, event planning, and running of companies (and dare I say, our private lives) took up the time to get this done.
Well the team is now back from Europe, and yes, gearing up for Vegas, but the first issue they dealt with was this one.
Joe Brinkman worked direcltly with me to try to resolve this issue, and after evaluating the current state of the code to be merged, and quantifying the functional areas that would require regression testing we decided to forego this feature for the 03.05.00 release.
Before you go off shooting at me again, let me assure you that we did not take this decision lightly. It was weighed against the risks of having the community wait even longer. For the record, this final decision was made on Monday.
Today, I have personally completed all the fixes for issue discover during the last release tracker submission, and the packaged module is ready to go into the tracker again tomorrow. The blog team is currently performing one more smoke test prior to submission.
I hope (and this is no promise), to have the module released within a week's time. I will push on all the team members responsible for the release process and try my best to expedite it (or until I receive death threats).
Before closing, I want to answer a couple of questions that were asked in this thread, and although my answers may not provide immediate solutions, you will at least know where "Mr. Chagoury" stands.
Voice Smith said: Was the "so close" post in July premature? [citing my blog post published soon after the first tracker release]
Antonio: Absolutely not. I would rather accept blame for being a poor planner, rather than not communicate.
Voice Smith said: Is there something out of your control that is getting in the way of release or any type of movement?
Antonio: Absolutely. There are several things that are beyong our control. As members of a broader team it is incumbent upon us to accept each other's faults, accept constructive criticism and learn. I am sure all of us have learned something from this, and we will act accordingly in the future.
Voice Smith said: Has the - or Could the - current code be made available so that people who have an interest can see what has been done and perhaps help get it moving again?
Antonio: The current code base has not been made available, and will not be made available until its final release.
I personally do not agree with this process, and do believe that, as an open source project, the community should be able to obtain the source; of course with no assurances as to its working condition.
I will raise this issue for discussion in our next core/project team lead meeting and report back on the outcome.
That being said, you CAN download the source for previous versions such as version 03.04.00 from the downloads page.
Devsmith said: ... that my post would possibly spur Antonio into seeing that it was worth getting back on the stick.
Antonio: I am not sure if I should take offense to this or not - LOL - but I can assure you that no one on the team was slacking off, in case this is what you wanted to verify.
Finally, let me apologize on behalf of myself, the blog team, and DNN Corp for the delays but at the same time, allow me to re-iterate that the delays were cause by decisions made in good-faith.
I also want to thank Dario, for his continued dedication to answering your questions no matter how hard and controversial the topic may be.
Thank you for listening.