Is there a reason to have source4 in 3.4 releases?

[Adam Tauno Williams]

On Wed, 2009-07-15 at 10:00 -0500, John H Terpstra - Samba Team wrote:
> Does it matter in the least what the samba4 directory is called?
> I urge you all to consider the real issue.  Our problem is fundamentally
> one of lack of clarity in respect of our roadmap.
> Network managers and administrators want to know:
> 	1) What is ready for use?
> 	2) How do I use it?
> 	3) What benefits do I get?
> Can we not provide a roadmap? One that spells out:
> 	a) Which parts of the currently stable parts of Samba live in
>            each directory
> 	b) What the "current" development schedule is for each WIP
>             (WIP == Work in progress) and projected "ready date"
>         c) A list of future projects and a current ranking of importance

As a mere network administrator who runs an almost entirely Open Source
stack for ~500 users I can only say "Ditto!".  At this point I am pretty
confused regarding the state of things;  I lurk this list to try and
keep track of what is going on.  With all the other admin related things
calling to me 24/7 it is hard to dedicate the [not inconsequential] time
required to keep track of what is going on.

I really do not mean this as a complaint or gripe;  Samba has been great
since the first time I installed it on AIX 3.2.  But at least from my
trench Mr. Terpstra's comment(s) look spot on.

> Somehow, some way, we need to re-present Samba to the user world in a
> more cohesive and tangible way.  We are losing ground.  We are losing
> users.  We are losing support.
> ...
> Too many corporate sites have moved away from Samba because they could
> not see a roadmap, failed to understand our direction, could no longer
> wait for AD server support, and had too many problems.  Each time a
> problem was has been raised I have been able to point them to the fix,
> but they had already abandoned Samba.  The problem is not technical - it
> is a communication challenge.

Yes.  Of the more than a dozen local sys-admins I talk to pretty
regularly - all of which ran Samba, and most Samba PDCs, at one point -
I'm the last Samba PDC shop and the second to last Samba [at all] shop. 

> We need clarity and unity in direction.

That would be a good thing, IM-veryH-O.