Contribute to the DSpace Development Fund

The newly established DSpace Development Fund supports the development of new features prioritized by DSpace Governance. For a list of planned features see the fund wiki page.

Developers Meeting on Thurs, May 1, 2025

Time/Location

 from 14:00-15:00 UTC

Location: https://lyrasis.zoom.us/my/dspace?pwd=RTk4QUhISnhPRi9YenVrTFJKbDllQT09 (Meeting ID: 502 527 3040).  Passcode: dspace


9.0 Release Schedule

  • New Feature Development Deadlines
    • (tick) Feature PR Creation Deadline: Friday, February 21, 2025
    • (tick) Feature PR Review/Test Deadline: Friday, March 14
    • (tick) Feature PR Merge Deadline: Friday, March 28
  • (tick) 9.0 Release Candidate:  Friday, April 4
  • (tick) 9.0 Testathon: April 7-18 (two weeks)
  • (tick) 9.0 Translation updates: April 7-18 (during Testathon)
  • Bug Fix Deadlines
    • Bug Fix PR Creation Deadline: Friday, May 2
    • Bug Fix PR Merge Deadline: Friday, May 16
  • Documentation & Release Week: May 19-23 
  • 9.0 Release Announced: Monday, May 26, 2025

Agenda

Attendees

Current Work

Project Boards

To quickly find PRs assigned to you for review, visit https://github.com/pulls/review-requested  (This is also available in the GitHub header under "Pull Requests → Review Requests")

Goals for 9.0

To be decided by DSpace Steering Group with feedback from Leadership Group. 

Priorities listed at DSpace Release 9.0 Status. 

Goals for 8.2 / 7.6.4

Deadline is TBD for both 8.2 and 7.6.4.  Bug fix releases do not have fixed/scheduled deadlines. Instead, the developer team will determine when to create a release based on the significance of the issues to solve. (e.g. If major issues are fixed, then a bug fix release will occur more rapidly.  If minor issues are found, then a bug fix release may be delayed until sufficient fixes have been made to warrant a release)

  • Bug/security fixes only.  These minor releases will not include any new features.
    • New "themeable components" (for dspace-angular) are allowed in bug fix releases, provided that they don't significantly modify component behavior or similar.
    • Accessibility fixes are also allowed in bug fix releases, provided they don't significantly modify component behavior or similar.
  • Bug fix PRs should be created against "main" branch where possible. The "main" branch has the most strict code style rules. (i.e. PRs created against dspace-7_x  are becoming more difficult to port forward.)
  • Per our support policy, bug fixes are only guaranteed to be ported back to 8.x.  That said, where possible, we'll try to backport bug fixes (especially significant ones) to 7.6.x.
    • Keep in mind, if a specific bug fix is important to you in 7.6.x, then it is best to create two PRs (one for main and one for "dspace-7_x").  If you are able to provide a backport version of the PR, then we will merge it alongside the "main" branch version.
    • NOTE: In many scenarios, a backport to "dspace-8_x" should be possible to automate using the "port to [branch]" labels & the "Port merged Pull Request" GitHub Action

Try "Pull Request Trading" for a quicker review

Do you have a PR stuck in "under review" that you really want to see move forward?  Or maybe it's someone else's PR but you want to get it more attention?

See Trading reviews on Pull Requests for how to get immediate attention to that PR!

Notes

  • Because of holidays in several countries (Italy, Belgium others), our attendance was very small today.
  • We reviewed the upcoming timelines for 9.0 development
  • Highlighted the "high priority" bug fixes that still remain for 9.0.  These bugs we'd like to see fixed in 9.0 (and some will be backported to 8.x and 7.6.x) if possible.
    • Called out https://github.com/DSpace/dspace-angular/pull/4227 (Remove "ssr.paths" configuration and replace with "ssr.excludePathRegexes")
      • This could use more eyes/testers.  It removes the "ssr.paths" configuration added in 8.1 / 7.6.3 to limit which paths in the UI will undergo server-side rendering (SSR).  This was necessary to help improve performance of the DSpace UI when hit heavily by bots.
      • The replacement is to do the opposite . Instead of only including specific paths we want to only exclude  specific paths via a new "ssr.excludePathRegexes" configuration.  This setting allows for using RegEx to more easily select specific paths.  We've also found that excluding only specific paths fixes bugs related to the wrong HTTP error code being returned (https://github.com/DSpace/dspace-angular/issues/4132)
      • Feedback on the new approach is welcome. Also take a look at the default settings for "excludePathRegexes" to see if there are additional paths you feel should be excluded from SSR.
  • Took a brief look at the 9.0 project board with general reminders
    • We still have a lot of bug PRs on this board (over 120).  Most of them will likely not get into 9.0 unless others help test them.  If there's a bug fix you want to see make it into 9.0 (and potentially be backported to 8.x and 7.6.x), please review or test it.  Once it gets to the "Reviewer Approved" column, Tim will help get it merged
    • Tim will be concentrating on "high priority" bug fixes, and ones related to accessibility or performance improvements.  He likely will not get to most of the other fixes on this list.
  • Questions about what's left on the 9.0 board and the release schedule.
    • Are we moving too fast and trying to put too much into 9.0?  Should we slow down how much we merge into 9.0?  Many people are still running 7.6.x and may not be looking to upgrade anytime soon.
      • Tim clarified that everything left on the 9.0 Board is a bug fix. (No more features will be added to 9.0.)  Most of these bug fixes also impact 8.x and 7.6.x (and will be backported as much as possible).  So, anything we can get merged now can also help 8.x and 7.6.x.
      • Tim noted the yearly release schedule (one major release per year) is decided by Steering, but we can provide feedback to them on the pace of releases.  One thing to be aware of though is that both Angular and some Java tools (Spring & Hibernate especially) are moving rather quickly with their own releases.  So, one reason for our yearly release schedule is to keep up with Angular & Java libraries.
      • Tim also reminded everyone that we support the last three major releases.  Once 9.0 is released, this means 7.6.x, 8.x and 9.x will all be supported releases of DSpace.   Once 10.0 is released, that will mean that the supported versions will be 8.x, 9.x and 10.x.
  • Wrapped up the meeting early because of lack of attendance & no further questions/feedback from attendees.

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