Discuss release frequency

[khaeru]

At the 2023-12-06 IAMC SWG meeting, we tentatively agreed on a first release sometime near 2024-01-31, or possibly +2 or +4 weeks (cf. #31)

We also raised the question of: how frequently should there be releases?

This issue is to discuss.

[khaeru]

My own thoughts:

• I think we should aim to release as often as possible.
  • One practice we use @iiasa for some codes is to version by date, so the version number is the date of release, for instance 2024.1.31. In this case one could make releases as often as daily, though in practice it's usually every few weeks.
  • If there are specific changes that need review from certain stakeholders, that review should always happen in a pull request, before such changes are merged to main. In other words: content on main should be considered ready for release.
• @gidden suggested that there be an annual rhythm to align with IPCC and other activities.
  • This is definitely valuable: certain purposes may need a more stable target.
  • I think we can also designate an "annual" or "long-term" release that can be the focus for these, while not blocking development or release of faster-moving updates.
  • This mirrors the practice of, for instance, Ubuntu.