Joel, I don't expect to have stuff ready for 5.1 - 22 Feb is two days before I return to the States. I don't think we should delay on my account. I'm working with Barry Books on high-level Tcl API for the definition of object types (an extension of my original work on such definitions for CR stuff) and we'll be experimenting until we satisfy ourselves, then TIP'ing, then dumping code in ...
As far as requiring all core developers to shove new development to the side in order to work on bug fixing ... that's impractical IMO in an environment where so many are dependent on client contracts for survival. When such work results in approved changes to the core, I see no reason why one should be asked to ice their client and to switch mode to bug fixing. Contractors need to hold client deadlines in high regard, as we all know.
I plan to help with bugs when I get back home, but I'm not planning to switch to that mode 100%. Dropping ongoing work entirely is really inefficient ... I don't know about others, but I find it hard to step away from a problem for two, three or four weeks then to jump back in. Takes time to regain the mental thread that's driving development.
We've been following the branch-at-freeze paradigm for, oh, four years from now and IMO it has actually served us quite well. Yes, merging is a pain, I realize that.
As Joel points out, using local repositories followed by massive checkins of finished code results in the loss of history. It's also a PITA, IMO ...
We all know that CVS is a very, very imperfect tool ... I think the problem is one of finding a solution that's the least painful to the largest set of developers, rather than finding a solution that's really wonderful. Call me a pessimist.
