Hi Josef,
looking back at the the roadmap of 2016 it is clear that we missed some items; nevertheless, I think all in all the year went well. Norman already noted some observations, namely prioritizing the existing user base over the future one. Looking back at this week's clean-up efforts I believe that spending more time on refining the base APIs was indeed the right decision. Using the new interface or switching the used kernel seamlessly while testing components feels so natural now and with the ABI mechanism provides a great foundation for building the infrastructure for package/deployment management.
it's really nice to read your reflection, now that we adapted a significant amount of components to the new API. This is exactly what I hoped to achieve with the new API!
That being said, one thing I missed from last year's roadmap discussion (although I am not sure if that was actually discussed on the ML or only at a coffee break) is the intention of making more information about Genode available to and by the community, i.e. in the form of writing how-tos for specific tasks or just by writing informally about interesting things that happend while working on Genode. Since parts of the APIs were or are still in flux I understand that it is difficult to write detailed articles that are valid for the years to come and probably one of the reason why one hesitates to spend time on that. That merely leaves the more informal part. Judging by the huge amount of out-dated information for <insert your favourite topic here> in all the weblogs on the internet I am not sure if spending time on that is a good idea either. Than again, were is the harm in documenting the process of writing a new component or porting existing software [1] to Genode? After all it should be fine if the focus is more on the process or the methodology. So, that is a goal of mine for 2017 — scheduled (emphasis on that) writing about what I do with Genode in hope that it is useful to somebody or even that others join in :-)
I like the idea very much. Dropping a comprehensive release-notes document every three months is not perfect to keep the attention of interested bystanders captured. A blog-like format would be a very good addition!
Cheers Norman