Erik Brooks

I'm sure some people are jumping right in here with a raised eyebrow so let me say this up front:  I'm not tired of hearing about new features coming in 8.5.1.
 
What I'm tired of is finding and hearing about all of the things that are still broken in 8.5 FP1 that won't be fixed until 8.5.1 ships. Some of which have apparently been "fixed" since March but still didn't make it into 8.5 FP1.
 
DDE is pig-dog slow, glitchy, and buggy. And riddled with stuff that still hasn't been fixed since the 2nd Beta for 8.5.0.
 
According to some forum posts many of these things are "fixed in 8.5.1" or "much improved in 8.5.1".  Good thing we read the forum. Once again I ask: what has happened to the Fix List database? It's a ghost town.
 
8.5 shipped with enough regression bugs to sink a ship. Heck, it had a Critical Fix released the same day as it shipped. I've been working with Lotus Support on some 8.5.0 and 8.5 FP1 crashes for 2+ months revolving around the NotesViewNavigator class, which was proven buggy as far back as January. That class has been around since R5, but apparently was changed in 8.5 (for XPages, if I had to guess). Logic would dictate that IBM would have unit tested that backwards and forwards, but it obviously wasn't. This is Software Quality 101 stuff here, guys.
 
8.5.1 is supposedly on track for an October release. TEN months for a dot-one update? I think that's a new Lotus record.  Heck, 8.5's first Fix Pack was a 7-month wait. Keep in mind that there is no 8.0.3 upcoming, and there will only be minor Fix Packs to 7.0.x from here on out.
 
Perhaps 8.5.1 is so far behind the usual schedule because it's got so many wonderful new things in it. That's nice, but it's got me worried. If there are more regressions is it going to be another 7 months before 8.5.1's first Fix Pack? If this is the new Lotus release schedule, the quality better be way up there. 8.5.0 simply doesn't cut it.
 
Keep in mind that I wouldn't be so irate if it wasn't for all the good stuff that's so close, yet out-of-reach: XPages, DAOS, etc...Hopefully 8.5.1 will be the "real" 8.5.0.
 
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