How Linaro plan's, debates, works on, and ultimately delivers a game changing release every 6 months.

1. Planning and Executing the
Linaro Cycle
Jamie Bennett, Release Manager
Linaro.org

2. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

3. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

4. Requirements
Who makes the decisions on what
will be worked on in Linaro?

5. Requirements
Requirements are defined by the
Technical Steering Committee
(TSC) which is made up of the
Linaro Chief Technical Officer
(CTO), the Vice President (VP)
of engineering and a
representative from each of the
Linaro Core and Club members.
See http://www.linaro.org/how-linaro-works/ and
https://wiki.linaro.org/TSC for more information

6. Requirements
When are the decisions made?

7. Requirements
Around two months before the Linaro at Ubuntu Developer
Summit (L@UDS) a Call for Requirements (CFR) is made to
the TSC members asking what they would like to see in the
next release. These requirements are collated together to
form the initial Technical Specification document by the
CTO, with input from the Technical Leads (TL) of each
engineering team.

8. Requirements
Around one month before the Linaro Developer Summit
(LDS) the TSC gathers to discuss the Technical
Specification. The items that are approved are collated
together in the Technical Requirements document. This
document defines what Linaro will be working on for the
upcoming cycle.

9. Requirements
The month between the Technical Requirements being
accepted and LDS is used by the engineering teams to
produce Blueprints. These Blueprints are accompanied by
a specification detailing the requirements implementation,
goals, and expected outcomes.

10. Requirements
At LDS each Blueprint is discussed with interested parties.
The feasibility and importance is defined and implementation
details are discussed. The outcome of a LDS session should
be a clearer understanding of the requirement and
valuable input from a wide audience.

11. Requirements
The two weeks after LDS are spent improving the initial
specification, adding input from LDS and defining the
individual steps that need to be taken for the requirement to
be fulfilled.
At this stage a Tech Lead will sign off the Blueprint and
implementation can start.

12. Requirements
Just before Feature Definition Freeze the TSC will meet to
ensure that the Technical Requirements have been
captured as expected during the definition phase.

13. Requirements
Before Feature Freeze the TSC will meet again to review
the set of features implemented at this stage and relate
them back to the original Technical Requirements document.
There is a small scope for last minute changes here.

14. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

15. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
What is the Linaro Developer Summit?

16. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
Linaro members at the Ubuntu Developer Summit in Belgium
before Linaro was announced.

17. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
• Co-hosted with the Ubuntu Developer Summit
• Officially called Linaro@UDS
• 300+ participants from Canonical, Linaro, the community and
anyone interested
• Linaro discussions around all aspects of the ARM ecosphere
• Next Summit October 25th-29th 2010 in Orlando Florida
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Events/2010-10-LDS for more information

18. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
Who is the Linaro@UDS Summit for?

19. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
• Developers interested in contributing to Linaro.
• Tech Leaders interested in influencing and contributing to the
direction Linaro takes in the next 6 months.
• Community members interested in participating in the Linaro
ecosphere.
• Partners, OEMʼs, ISVʼs and Downstreams interested in
leveraging Linaroʼs effort.
• Upstreams interested in ensuring their software is integrated well
into Linaro.

20. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
What is discussed at the Linaro@UDS?

21. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
Small selection of sessions at the last developer summit.

22. Linaro Developer Summit (LDS)
• All Sessions start off as Blueprints in Launchpad including
informational only sessions.
• Sessions are Scheduled by hand from the pool of Blueprints
registered against the current Developer Summit.
• Not all sessions can be accommodated. The relative merit of each
session will be a factor in the schedule organisers decision to
approve or disapprove.
• If you are interested in a session, subscribe to the relavant
Blueprint in Launchpad.
• See http://summit.ubuntu.com for the latest schedule.

23. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

24. Blueprints
What are Blueprints?

25. Blueprints
A Blueprint is used to track the development of a project, a
feature or any other process towards its goal.
Blueprints are used extensively by the Linaro project.
See http://www.launchpad.net/+tour/feature-tracking for more information

26. Blueprints

27. Blueprints
Anatomy
• Summary
• Priority, status, implementation
• Approver, drafter, assignee
• Related branches
• Whiteboard
• Subscribers

28. Blueprints
Anatomy
• Summary
• One paragraph explanation of what the blueprint is tracking.
• Priority, status, implementation
• Shows blueprint importance, status and current format.
• Approver, drafter, assignee
• People involved in completing the blueprint.
• Related branches and bugs
• Any code or bugs related to the blueprint.
• Whiteboard
• Free-form text used to track progress.
• Subscribers
• People who want to be informed of progress.

29. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

30. The Release Cycle
The Release Cycle is made up of 6 releases over a 6
month period. 3 Alpha releases, 1 Beta, 1 Release
Candidate and 1 Final Release.
In between releases, various milestones are created to
ensure the release is on track. These include Feature
Definition Freeze, Feature Freeze, and Final Freeze.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/Cycle for more information

31. The Release Cycle
Two of the most important milestones when dealing with new
features are Feature Definition Freeze and Feature Freeze.
By Feature Definition Freeze all new features should be clearly
defined and requirements should not change much.
By Feature Freeze, all new features will be close to fully
implemented. No new features will be added.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/Cycle/ReleaseStages
for more information

32. The Release Cycle
Alpha releases are primarily targeted at early adopters.
There is a great deal of changes that go on in the early
release stages and that is reflected in the image stability.
New features and the majority of changes happen between
LDS and Beta. There are exceptions.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/Cycle/ReleaseStages
for more information

33. The Release Cycle
Beta is a stable release and expected to be functional but
with bugs. From this point forwards only bug fixes happen as
the release is stabilised.
Release Candidate is produced 1 week before release. In a
perfect world there would be no changes from this point until
release but last minute small fixes can be made at this
point.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/Cycle/ReleaseStages
for more information

34. The Release Cycle
Final Release should be completely stable and fully
functional. Minor bugs could be present but any known
bugs will be documented in the release notes.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/Cycle/ReleaseStages
for more information

35. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

36. Out of Cycle Contributions
Work is constantly going on both inside and outside of
Linaro. The various Working Groups and other
Engineering Units, including Landing Teams, produce
outputs that do not necessarily line up with the release
milestones.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/AdvancedDevelopment
for more information

37. Out of Cycle Contributions
The output from these groups can be accepted into the release
at any point up until the Freeze Period.
Work outside of the release schedule is called Advanced
Development.
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/AdvancedDevelopment
for more information

38. Schedule
• Requirements Gathering
• The Linaro Developer Summit
• Blueprints
• The Release Cycle
• Out of Cycle Contributions
• Tracking

39. Tracking
With all the engineering effort going on, how do you track
progress?

40. Tracking
• Meetings
• Blueprints
• Work Items
• Burn Down Charts
• Wiki Status Pages
• Upstream contributions

41. Tracking
Meetings
• IRC
• Mumble
• Conference Calls
• Face-to-Face

42. Tracking
Work Items

43. Tracking
Work Items
• Assignee in brackets
• e.g. [JamieBennett]
• Description of item todo
• Status of item
• TODO, DONE, LATER, POSTPONED
• LATER used to track items that miss their deadline
• POSTPONED used to track items that do not get done in the cycle
See http://wiki.linaro.org/Process/WorkItemsHowto
for more information

44. Tracking
Burn Down Charts

45. Tracking
Burn Down Charts
• Number of work items over time
• Each team has its own burn down chart
• Done, Todo, In Progress, Later (slipped)
• Other teams items that effect the project also shown
• Automatically generated every two hours

46. Tracking
Wiki Status Pages

47. Tracking
Wiki Status Pages
• Snapshot of projects current status
• Each team has its own status page
• Broken down milestone date
• Further broken down by blueprint
• Further broken down by work item
• Easy to see current team status
See http://wiki.linaro.org/EngineeringUnits/Status
for more information

48. Tracking
Upstream Contributions
• Upstream contribution trackers
• Automated tools coming to better report on contributions
• Initial implementation for GCC only can be found at
http://ex.seabright.co.nz/helpers/patchtrack
See http://wiki.linaro.org/UpstreamTrees
for more information

49. Questions?
jamie.bennett@linaro.org