FIRMWARE BUG ALERT

[adairw]

OK, loaded RC 18 and it does appear to have fixed my problem. Been running for about 12 minutes and have made 4 or 5 changes to the vlans page and nothing stopped working.

Looks good here.

Thanks guys!

I'm going to say this and no one is probably going to like it, but developing some better testing policies is probably needed if you want to avoid the mikrotik way of doing things, i.e. let the customers beta test it and find the bugs.. I know crap happens but this seems like a problem that should have never happened or caught in QC.

I'm not mad, I'm still going to buy and recommend people buy wisp switches, but to much of this and it could be a bad thing for people.
I know you want to hit dead lines and I know you want to add features, we are all screaming for them.. but a clean, stable product is a must.
With all that said, I know I used RC15, so I was probably asking for this. should have done my own testing, blah, blah blah.

[sirhc]

OK, loaded RC 18 and it does appear to have fixed my problem. Been running for about 12 minutes and have made 4 or 5 changes to the vlans page and nothing stopped working.

Looks good here.

Thanks guys!

I'm going to say this and no one is probably going to like it, but developing some better testing policies is probably needed if you want to avoid the mikrotik way of doing things, i.e. let the customers beta test it and find the bugs.. I know crap happens but this seems like a problem that should have never happened or caught in QC.

I'm not mad, I'm still going to buy and recommend people buy wisp switches, but to much of this and it could be a bad thing for people.
I know you want to hit dead lines and I know you want to add features, we are all screaming for them.. but a clean, stable product is a must.
With all that said, I know I used RC15, so I was probably asking for this. should have done my own testing, blah, blah blah.

I agree, the problem is "most" everyone kept pushing for these new feature sets. And everyone always wanted just one feature added or changed.

But we do have a stable non RC version - v1.0.10:

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD FIRMWARE v1.0.10 - Released 1/23/2015 <------------
THIS IS A STABLE FINAL OLDER RELEASE WITHOUT THE NEW FEATURE SETS

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD FIRMWARE v1.1.0rc18 - CURRENTLY UNDER TESTING.
This version has all the new feature sets.

Once v1.1.0 is stable people will have to ask permission to get the newer RC versions and it will be a limited group. I think we are done adding features. for awhile anyway.

[Rory]

I'm going to say this and no one is probably going to like it, but developing some better testing policies is probably needed if you want to avoid the mikrotik way of doing things, i.e. let the customers beta test it and find the bugs.. I know crap happens but this seems like a problem that should have never happened or caught in QC.

I'm not mad, I'm still going to buy and recommend people buy wisp switches, but to much of this and it could be a bad thing for people.
I know you want to hit dead lines and I know you want to add features, we are all screaming for them.. but a clean, stable product is a must.
With all that said, I know I used RC15, so I was probably asking for this. should have done my own testing, blah, blah blah.

We have actually had this conversation internally. We agree with your observations wholeheartedly. While the development process for anything rarely goes as planned, we do agree that there have been more bumps in the road than we are really comfortable with.

Thankfully we have been able to gather enough feedback from our customers that I think we will be able to streamline the testing and release process in the future. Believe me when I say that I commiserate with your struggle, I am the network admin for our WISP as well. We understand all too well the headaches that come from outages, and we are working hard to ensure that none of us in this industry are affected by such events. From the perspective of our products, anyway.

Thanks for your feedback. Please do not fear the reaction to observations based in fact. We're all adults here, we can take honesty.

[adairw]

[lligetfa]

There is always a limit to what configuration convolutions can be tested in-house and at some point the testing needs to move beyond that. Yes there were a couple of bugs that should not have slipped through and I trust that steps have been taken to limit such occurrences.

One point we need to keep in mind is that RC is beta, not stable. Anyone deploying RC really should lab test it before unleashing it on a production system. That also goes for stable versions. Test before your deploy. Have a fallback plan.

[adairw]

Yes, and I mentioned that.
good points.

[sirhc]

Trust me I have taken flack from David, Eric, and Rory about releasing the RC versions so fast but here was the issues as to why.

All the features in the RC were features people kept hounding me for, either by emails, PM, and even phone calls.

I was told by some that they bought our switches but can not deploy them because they needed this or wanted that.

Now since all the features that were mentioned/promised in our initial firmware road map when we announced this product line are in the current v1.1.0rc18 once it is stable and final released I will be more stingy about how fast and who I release RC versions to in the future or will make you click through a couple ARE YOU SURE buttons to even get them.

I guess I was a victim of peer pressure and tried to hard to get some features to people and I got flack internally and by the users so now that I will soon have (I hope) a final version with all the promised features I will become much more conservative on releases after that.

If I was Adair I would have uploaded v1.1.0rc15 and soon as I saw an issue I would have exported my config then down graded to v1.0.10 FINAL RELEASE and then reported the BUG.

I recently rolled out an RC version that was never released to you guys to one of our towers near my house late at night and it just broke. The tower was down so I drove to the tower which was 10 minutes from my house which is why I chose that tower and downgraded back to the previous version and the tower came back up.

[adairw]

I didn't down grade because once I figured out it was a problem and what to do to fix it, I could get things working.
Plus I figured you'd want to see it in the "broke" state. Just trying to help troubleshoot. :)

Anyway, I think you're doing a good job, just some constructive criticism. And I'm kicking myself for not trying testing better either.

[sirhc]

I didn't down grade because once I figured out it was a problem and what to do to fix it, I could get things working.
Plus I figured you'd want to see it in the "broke" state. Just trying to help troubleshoot. :)

Anyway, I think you're doing a good job, just some constructive criticism. And I'm kicking myself for not trying testing better either.

I know Adair, and we all appreciate your assistance in developing this product line, it is users like you that have been INVALUABLE!

I am just tired and burned out and a little bit defensive as I have been dealing with flack from all directions.

Sometimes tough decisions must be made at the top and not everyone is privy to all the information that led to those decisions and why.

The buck stops here, I get that, so the blame is mine and mine alone but trust me I have my life savings and my kids college funds all on the line here so I do not take these decisions lightly but sometimes you are in for a penny in for a pound, all in or bust.

It is like the last play the Sea Hawks called last night, had they scored the coach would have been hailed as a genius.

[sirhc]

Hey Adair, I assume all is going well with the new v1.1.0rc18?

Please provide feedback on it or anything you find wrong so we can either fix it or soon hopefully if enough people weigh in that all is fine we can FINAL RELEASE it.