"Rick [Kitty5]" <spa### [at] kitty5com> wrote in
news:3ee7763b$1@news.povray.org: 

> 
> So why not roll up a couple of the patches in while your at it , if
> for no other reason than to keep the official release relevant.
> 

I am guessing because:

  1) It would no longer be a bugfix release

  2) They would need to support patches they did not write or
     rewrite them.

  3) It would need a beta period.

  4) It would just further delay 4.0

  5) The patches are already available elsewhere

  6) They don't want to ;)

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In article <3ee7763b$1@news.povray.org> , "Rick [Kitty5]" 
<spa### [at] kitty5com> wrote:

> So why not roll up a couple of the patches in while your at it , if for no

The POV-Team is not Micro$oft and does not combine a ton of half-finished
code into something then called a "release" instead of properly calling it
an alpha test version.

> other reason than to keep the official release relevant.

I think you seriously lost track of reality by only reading these newsgroups
frequented by several very advanced users.  While there are a few dozen
users who play with some of the features a few unofficial versions provide,
there are tens of thousands of users who use the official version of POV-Ray
for their work because it provides a stable and reliable environment with
finished features that have been well-tested.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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In article <Xns### [at] 204213191226> , Tom Galvin 
<tom### [at] imporg>  wrote:

>   1) It would no longer be a bugfix release

Any stable release of any version that adds big chunks of code would take
several month.

>   2) They would need to support patches they did not write or
>      rewrite them.

Rewrite. No offense to those who work on MegaPOV or the other patches, but
they indeed all suffer from exactly the same problems the patches that the
POV-Team had to integrate into 3.5.  The current patches hardly get finished
or bugfixed very well.  Don't expected anybody in the POV-Team is willing to
repeat the same mistake again by reusing code from patches that don't work
and then take years to get fixed.

>   3) It would need a beta period.

It sure would.

>   4) It would just further delay 4.0

No, it would kill POV-Ray.  The time wasted to rewrite and fix logic of new
patches would do damage beyond repair to thug motivation of POV-Team
members.  The POV-Team is **not** the throw-some-half-baked-patch-and-get-
them-to-fix-it-team.  Programming is fun, debugging is hard work.  And doing
it all day for a living does not imply anybody wants to do it in all their
free time.  In fact, that is the main reason why so few patches ever reach a
true release quality state.

>   5) The patches are already available elsewhere

Indeed.

>   6) They don't want to ;)

No, because there is no need to.  The need of a very few should never be
considered as major goal in any software project.  Otherwise you end up with
bloated, buggy software just like you use it every day and wish at least the
0.1% of the features you need daily (which happen to be 0.001% of the
features actually in the program) would work.


    Thorsten


____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
  While there are a few dozen
> users who play with some of the features a few unofficial versions provide,
> there are tens of thousands of users who use the official version of POV-Ray
> for their work because it provides a stable and reliable environment with
> finished features that have been well-tested.
> 
Just out of curiosity, is there really tens of thousands users of POV-Ray?

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Vahur Krouverk wrote:
>Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
>  While there are a few dozen
>> users who play with some of the features a few unofficial versions provide,
>> there are tens of thousands of users who use the official version of POV-Ray
>> for their work because it provides a stable and reliable environment with
>> finished features that have been well-tested.
>>
>Just out of curiosity, is there really tens of thousands users of POV-Ray?

Well, there are tens of thousands of downloads of POV-Ray every month. Not
counting mirrors, computer magazine distributions, distribution with 3rd
party software and so on. So if only a few percent of those who download
POV-Ray actually use it...

    Thorsten

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in
news:3ee788fe@news.povray.org: 


> 
>>   4) It would just further delay 4.0
> 
> No, it would kill POV-Ray.  

No offense Thorsten, but I don't think you could kill POV-Ray now, even if 
you wanted to.  But I understand what you meant.

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ABX,

That's great. I'm looking forward to the MegaPOV with HDRI support!
That should work fine. With 3.1 people who wanted the experimental or
advanced features migrated to MegaPOV, and all went well. I do think
that a consolidation of patches is needed, and will be appreciated ;-)

Harolddd

"Włodzimierz ABX Skiba" <abx### [at] abxartpl> wrote in message
news:web.3ee7436d516e68b8465fc1770@news.povray.org...
> Michael Goldshteyn wrote:
> > Optimized for the P4, even.
>
> Sources with HDRI support are available at Mael's site, feel free to
> download and compile it with expected optimizations. If you are patient
you
> can receive MegaPOV with HDRI support near soon thought I do not know
> optimization flags of binaries dedicated to your favourite destination
> platform. AFAIK 3.6 release will never happen.
>
> ABX
>
>
>
>

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On Wed, 11 Jun 2003 16:50:37 EDT, "Thorsten" <nomail@nomail> wrote:
> Well, there are tens of thousands of downloads of POV-Ray every month.

What is the number of registered users in 'community' section of website ?

ABX

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In article <0h5gevcdebtb15ovrhembitf448b2pr8fa@4ax.com> , ABX 
<abx### [at] abxartpl>  wrote:

> On Wed, 11 Jun 2003 16:50:37 EDT, "Thorsten" <nomail@nomail> wrote:
>> Well, there are tens of thousands of downloads of POV-Ray every month.
>
> What is the number of registered users in 'community' section of website ?

There are 4356 distinct names in the web news view.  And there are 1525
users registered in the community section.  Further, there are over 15000
(complete) downloads of POV-Ray 3.5 from povray.org alone, every month.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> I think you seriously lost track of reality by only reading these
> newsgroups frequented by several very advanced users.  While there
> are a few dozen users who play with some of the features a few
> unofficial versions provide, there are tens of thousands of users who
> use the official version of POV-Ray....

Would be interesting to see the download statistics comparing pov3.1g to its
MegaPOV counterpart. But as you dont have these statistics what assumption
is the above based on?

-- 
Rick

Kitty5 NewMedia http://Kitty5.com
POV-Ray News & Resources http://Povray.co.uk
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