Greg Smith's Weekly Report

[Greg Smith]

Hi All,

Here's my weekly report for week ending 9/26.

***********************
Status against last week goals:
1 - Hound engineers to close all 8.2.0 blockers (see
http://dev.laptop.org/report/28) and get a firm date for the Release
Candidate build. Triage bugs and keep the release on schedule.

GS - Done! In the end, no hounding was needed :-) Triaged bugs but fell 
a little behind the incoming rate this week. Also picked and tested
a set of additional activities to add to the G1G1 default install.

2 - Clean up open bugs section of 8.2. release notes. Get release notes
ready for final review.

GS - Mostly done. Top section finished and ready for final review. Human
readable explanation and categorization of key bugs started. Final edits
and comments welcome: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Release_notes/8.2.0

3 - Write 8.2 launch plan and technical overview presentation.

GS - Not done. Wrote brief blurb on the release for re-use in promoting 
it. Still need to list communication vehicles, choose the right landing 
page (Release notes?) and refine the high level message for the release.

First pass release message:
8.2 has major enhancements including:
- A flexible Home view and Journal with several options for searching 
and organizing activities.
- An enhanced Frame for accessing other XOs and peripherals and for
switching between running activities.
- A Graphical Control Panel for setting language, network, power and
other defaults.
- An automated Software Update tool which finds the latest version of
activities and updates them over the Internet.
- Capability to backup XOs to a school server and restore files to the
Journal as needed.
- A new manual shipped with the XO as an activity.
- Many other bug fixes and enhancements.

For more details, see the final draft of the Release Notes at:
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Release_notes/8.2.0

4 - Share and post 8.2.1 time frame and operating procedure (e.g. Trac
queries). Start planning for Early Field Trial/Beta of 8.2.1. Keep
pushing for an engineering leader/owner of 8.2.1.

GS - Not done. Pushed for an engineering owner a little but not too hard
until 8.2 is done.

5 - Review and finalize short 9.1 strategy description. Restructure
requirements section to align with strategy. Fold in more deployment
requirements. Keep pushing for an engineering leader/owner of 9.1.
Stretch goal: prepare to write detailed requirements sections and start
scrubbing bugs to create working Trac queries.

GS - Mostly not done. Added a few more details, discussed strategy and
country demands. Added some more detailed requirements for deployability
  at:
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/9.1.0#Security.2C_Activation_and_Deployability

6 - Update deployments page. Update releases page and start using new
semantic format (thanks to S Page for laying out the structure). Also
update XS sections of releases page.

GS - Not done but did get approval to repost statistics on XOs
"Delivered, shipped and ordered" by country. See also this URL for new
deployment and XO information:

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Learning_Workshops
Some of this will be integrated in my next update of the Deployments page.

******************
Goals for next week in priority order:

1 - Get 8.2 to manufacturing. Catch up on bug triage.

2 - Finish 8.2 Release notes and get final review of them from engineering.

3 - Finalize blurb used to promote the release and start sending it out
to internal lists. Write more generally usable Release message.

4 - Update deployments page and releases page.

5 - Post more detailed 8.2.1 page and restructure 9.1 page.

6 - Once 8.2 ships, open a bottle of Champagne. One glass then start 
work on the next release :-)

Thanks,

Greg S