BlogML 2.5 Road Map
For the first time in BlogML history we're publishing an official road map for BlogML specification and .NET API. Of course, there is no guarantee that we achieve all these plans but we will try to do our best. Our initial plans is to release the Beta version of BlogML 2.5 at the end of February 2008 and its final version at the end of March 2008.
- Upgrading .NET library to .NET 3.5 - BlogML 2.0 was released on top of the .NET Framework 2.0 but now that .NET 3.5 is public, we'll release 2.5 based on this new version and will apply its new features.
- Adding XML comments - As the first stage of our plans to improve documentation we want to add XML comments to XML schema and .NET library codes
- Building a fresh new validator tool - Previous validator tools wasn't very user friendly and powerful. We're going to build a new validator tool based on WPF technology in .NET 3.5.
- Fixing bugs - We're bringing a few minor bugs and exceptions from previous versions that want to fix in 2.5.
- Refreshing .NET API - We need to do a total refreshment on .NET library and remove all obsolete methods and just keep current methods and API. We also want to improve our library against framework design guidelines.
- Unit Testing .NET Library - This process has begun from some months ago and we're at a good point. We want to unit test all .NET APIs to catch exceptions in our library.
- Support for tags - In parallel with existing categories, we want to add support for tags. Some blogging tools support both features and some other tools just support one of them.
- Support for pingbacks - Pingbacks are the third type of feedbacks for some blogging tools and hopefully BlogML 2.5 supports them out of the box.
- Support for IP address - As an optional feature we also want to add support for IP addresses and store the IP address of the post and the comment author and trackback and pingback sender.
- Support for aggregated views count - This another feature for some blogging tools that we'll include in 2.5 as an optional feature.
From this version and from now we have some other decisions for development strategy of BlogML that are considered in the above road map.
- Having Beta releases - We believed that having Beta releases helps us keep our project active and also lets us catch some bugs before official release. So after this we have at least one Beta release before each new version.
- Releasing new versions on a regular basis - It's almost 1.5 years since the last release of BlogML (2.0) and this is a long time. We think that having new versions on a regular basis even with a few improvements and bug fixes helps us keep activity on the project and avoid from doing lots of work for each version.
- Building documentation - The lack of documentation has been with BlogML since first version in 2005 and many of the feedbacks that we get specify this. We've decided to solve this problem as soon as possible. However, this needs more help from the community and new team members to help us by adding documentation to the project.
- #1 Gerard on 11.11.2008 at 9:00 PM
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Hi guys,
Sounds great that you have your roadmap and all, but its now November 2008 and there is no 2.5 available as yet. Is there any plans to get the ball rolling on this?
Keep up the good work! :)
