With all of the turmoil surrounding the PHP 5.1.0 and 5.1.1 releases just fading, there's already talk of the next release in the series - 5.1.2 - and a plan to follow to get there.

Here is a brief outline of how I see 5.1.2 release happening and what in my opinion should be included in the release. This is very much an RFC as far as the changes go, so feel free to comment.

First the release plan, my idea is to allow minor features with accompanying tests that do not introduce any BC issues or functionality regressions till the 10th of December. At this point we would go into a feature and major change lock down, till about 22nd of December when the first RC will be made.

Assuming a 1 week period without such fixes passes, final release will be tagged, making the last RC essentially that release. In the even critical issues are discovered, additional RCs will be rolled.

So, some of the target dates as mentioned above include Release Candidate 1 on Dec. 22nd, Release Candidate 2 on Jan. 5th, and a final of PHP 5.1.2 on Jan. 12th, 2006. You can also check out some of the planned changes as well...