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When is a scenery project ready for release

mmann

mmann

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I first posted this question at Sim-Outhouse, but on second thought I think fsdeveloper might be a better place to post it.

I have been working for a number of months on a scenery project covering Vancouver Island for Orbx PNW. I have over 14 Lighthouse stations (most with custom helipad platforms), 13 float plane bases with their docks, 9 heliports and a couple of unlisted airstrips. My problem is I keep coming up with more items to add to the scenery. I found I wanted AI float planes so I needed to create repaints for the default Beaver. When I added the lighthouses (fsx default) with the custom landable helipad platforms, the scenery looked stark, so I had to fire up 3ds Max and whip up some lightkeepers houses and sheds. Realizing that this is freeware scenery, I was wondering at what point a developer would choose to release a project. Starting was no problem, knowing when to quit is! Any feedback you can offer me would be most welcomed.

Regards, Mike Mann
 
Mike, that is a very cogent question! I know myself the angst I feel whenever I have time to work on my own 33MO project...

...as time goes by, I discover some "new thing or technique" that I just have to try out, with the end result being that what was to be a simple and quick project has morphed into a rather lengthy one... :D

Perhaps a more sensible path might be to package up what you have currently, release it to the wild, then as and when you've made additions, release that as an "optional upgrade" to the existing package.
 
Software development in generral have hat to deal with this question for a lot longer than FS addons (not to mention there can generally be quite a bit more at stake moneywise), and the general answer is actually quite simple:

Release early, release often.

The trick is to keep a working version you can release without too many half finished projects hanging there. This takes diciplin, but it's not exactly hard. You can even steal some of the agile software development methodologies if you like a bit of order. If you are working on your own or in a team where people are not making commitments on hours they work on it (so purely hobby work), consider Kanban. If you have a team committing a predictable amounts of hours doing a given timeline, Scrum might be worth a shot.
 
Hi,

I guess only the developer can answer this question :), since you are the only one to know what you want to achieve. So if you enjoy the process of adding more and more detail, it might take longer before you think it is ready for release.

I think there is no fixed rule for when something is ready, but it is a good idea to release now and then. You can always make an upgrade later on. It is nice to know that others are also using your addon.
 
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