Release models make a huge difference in the properties of the software delivered. I believe there is no single "ideal" model; what to choose depends on the code base, the group/community creating the code, the users/customers, the technology available (languages, CI tools, others)... What works for Hudson does not work for GlassFish nor for Solaris.

MySQL is changing its release model to improve agility, quality, predictability and facilitate contributions. Giuseppe just posted an Overview; in a nutshell, the trunk tree is always in beta quality, new features are first developed in stage branches, then integrated into the trunk, which is then brought to RC quality and another cycle starts (see Diagram). Full details at the MySQL Forge and in Tomas's Presentation at MySQL University (slides; recording is NYA).

The basic model seems feasible; now we need a few release cycles to adjust the model and we will see how it works in real-life. As Don Quijote said... the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

We've covered NetBeans 6.5 progress (Beta, RC) previously and we're now very happy to report on the final release. As always, the "New and Noteworthy" page is a great reference for the many new features, the big ones and (what can appear as) the smaller ones. "Compile-On-Save" is probably a little bit of both and certainly plays very well with the Deploy-On-Change feature and GlassFish v3's session preservation across redeployments. Support for PHP and Groovy/Grails are also additional signs of the ongoing push on dynamic and scripting languages on the JVM.

Get your favorite NetBeans IDE Bundle from the download page, it's very well organized. Note that you can start small and add features with a finer granularity if you want. You'll see that GlassFish is included in the "Java" bundle, but also that GlassFish v3 Prelude is in the Ruby bundle.

GlassFish v2 U2 patch 2 is now available to Sun enterprise customers of Sun GlassFish Server. Check out the details at GlassFish For Business: • Sun's Commercial Support for GlassFish Server • Overview of GFv2 Releases • GF v2 U2 patch 1 (SJS AS 9.1 U2 patch 1) - First commercial patch release. • GF v2 U2 patch 2 (SJS AS 9.1 U2 patch 2) - Second commercial patch release.

And it is out! This morning Ludo announced the Release of OpenDS 1.0! You can download the Core Server or the DSML Gateway or use a Java WebStart to launch it. For more details go to the Open DS home page or directly to the Promoted Build Information. Many congratulations to the team!

Over the weekend I added some entries to GlassFishForBusiness to describe the GFv2 releases. GFB is intended to track Sun's offerings to help you use the GlassFish Server in production; unlike TA, GFB is updated only occasionally so you may want to subscribe to its News Feed. The new entries are:

• Overview of GFv2 Releases • GF v2 (SJS AS 9.1) - First public release • GF v2 U1 (SJS AS 9.1 U1) - Public Update Release • GF v2 U2 (SJS AS 9.1 U2) - Second public Update Release. • GF v2 U2 patch 1 (SJS AS 9.1 U2 patch 1) - First commercial patch release. Patches come out every 6-8 weeks as part of Sun's Enterprise Support. GFv2U2 was going to be our first patch but became a public release to align with other releases.

Also recall that we will switch to Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server for Sun's distribution during the GFv2.1 release cycle. Until then those distributions will continue to use the old Sun Java System Application Server (or SJSAS).

Ah, the picture is that of Messier Objects, from his "Catalogue des Nébuleuses et des Amas d'Étoiles" (Wikipedia, Large Image).