Really Stupid Beta Question.

jonsidneyb

Well-known member
I have never been though a Beta before.

Is this the process.

Initial Beta....

Beta 1
Beta 2
Beta 3 and so on until official release?

My guess is official release is after it is decided that the last Beta was stable enough?
 
Ah...

A release candidate is the last one before Stable.

I am guessing the process could be a couple of months to a year.

XenForo seems almost ready for Stable to me but then again I have been on vB4
 
The importing needs work, but it's still early.
In the past after RC it's Gold Stable.
Can't put a time on how long it will take.
It will be Gold when the powers that be say it's Gold.
It's no longer about shareholders. We are a community once again.
smileyvault-cute-big-smiley-animated-024.gif
 
The importing needs work, but it's still early.
In the past after RC it's Gold.
Can't put a time on how long it will take.
It will be Gold when the powers that be say it's Gold.
It's no longer about shareholders. We are a community once again. :)

I agree....just anxious to get my forum off of vB4
 
Please don't use the "Gold" term, keeps reminding me of some bald middle age dude with an open shirt and more bling going down than Tammy Baker.

Jon there's no such thing as a stupid question we all got to ask the easy ones at some stage.
 
For those who have gone LIVE with the beta, will there be an upgrade process from beta to beta to rc to gold? or will we need to scrap everything and start from fresh with each release until gold. ?
 
For those who have gone LIVE with the beta, will there be an upgrade process from beta to beta to rc to gold? or will we need to scrap everything and start from fresh with each release until gold. ?
I'm sure there will be an upgrade path. I wouldn't expect anything else. But that is not to say features will change from Beta to Beta.
 
Ah...

A release candidate is the last one before Stable.

I am guessing the process could be a couple of months to a year.

XenForo seems almost ready for Stable to me but then again I have been on vB4
I definitely don't see XF being away from a gold state a year from now. At most, maybe a couple of months but knowing how Kier and Mike worked at vBulletin I see us sitting with XF 1.0.0 gold before the end of November.*

* I could be very wrong about this so I reserve the right to edit this notice out of my post at any time. Do not take my word for stone as I have no insider information and cannot have any form of evidence to prove my statement correct. By reading this fine print you are agreeing to not hold me against my word, and that any injury from reading such a statement is due to your own personal carelessness. I am also not responsible for loss of property, virtual or physical, or any harm that may come from the impending Zombie Attack.
 
Research & Development / Prototyping / Coding / Testing and "throwing it all together to get a first working build"
Pre-Alpha (or internal alpha)

Once ready, moving it to a less internal alpha with private testers is recommended, this is 'alpha stage'.

From alpha you can go live, allowing others to share to find additional feedback and bugs. I consider this pre-beta.

A private and/or public beta testing period has to start somewhere: Beta (beta 1).

Depending on completion of code, execution of ui/ux and improving on performance, allowing code under the hood to still be changed, and finishing up say documentation and what not. Various public beta releases might follow.

When there's a code freeze, and you could say it's 'the .zip you want to let people download', you can consider it ready enough. A release candidate (1) is born. This is also an option to put it up for sale. As a final RC-beta test. A few rc releases might follow. This is a great period to finalize documentation and site features as well.

Serious bugs out of the way? Minor todo list left? Satisfied customer feedback? Time for a 'RTM' or 'Gold' or 'Stable' release. The one you put in a shiny box with a bow around it.

A big amount of new customers will beta test it, finding more issues than before, and this could result in a few minor point releases to help improve stability and performance.

In the mean time beta tests can be done for newer bigger features, resulting in significant enough code changes to support them, allowing a version 1.1 beta followed by 1.1 stable. And the maintenance release cycle starts again until 1.2 or 2.0 is ready.

Creating software usually means having a mission statement, having done case studies and researc/development, prototyping your software and having an idea what you NEED NOW and what is more suitable for later. This creates an internal roadmap. And based on categories and ready-ness stages, you can have milestones, populated with todo items; All marking up an estimated amount of time something requires to be made, and when all milestones come together in the roadmap it's time for that first alpha, the second version or a major overhaul of the products.

At least :) that's how I look at it. I am sure the real professionals have a better idea and stick to a better plan. This works for me when I make a web site, try out a web app, or build an iPhone app , etc.
 
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