Well, 2.6 was just released but this does highlight a really big problem for us.
Like all developers, we got access to Confluence 2.6-dr1 some time ago on the Early Access Program (EAP) so that we could start testing with it.
This is useful because it allows us to see some of the glaring bugs well in advance and get working on them. But as it's not the final release, things will change.
So, we do some testing, find some bugs, report them.
We then see rc2 and rc3 appearing on http://confluence.atlassian.com, however we don't get access to them. So if bugs are being fixed, and things getting changed as a result, we have no way to test.
Next thing we know, 2.6 is formally released. We didn't get any advanced warning of this, even though we'd been asking regularly to get hold of rc2 and rc3. It just suddenly appears in public as the final release and clients get it at the same time as we developers get it. As a partner of Atlassian, we know nothing more than you do about the release date.
The problem here is that we now have to start our testing all over again. We've no idea what changed from rc1 to the formal release of 2.6.
But clients will already be upgrading. So mid way through our testing, before we've been able to check everything for compatibility, we'll start getting bug reports "hey, I've upgraded and XYZ has broken". So now, as well as trying to find and fix any bugs, we also have increased support load.
The thing is, our clients will assume this is down to us being crap. But there's simply no way we can test on the final version if Atlassian don't let us have it prior to release.
Because this happens every time there is a new Confluence release (admittedly most don't even have a EAP) it's impossible for us to align our plugins and services to each new release of Confluence.
It's been discussed with Atlassian quite a few times, but is obvious the message isn't being received. So I'm posting here, quite bluntly, for everyone to see.
We try hard, but when the supplier makes it impossible for us to test against new releases of their products before them becoming publicly available there is very little we can do.
Don't get me wrong, the EAP is very useful. But the final release candidate needs to go in the EAP, with at least a week or two to test it, before being released publicly.
You will be finding bugs when you upgrade to Confluence 2.6. We're working on them already but, like you, we've only just got hold of 2.6 final release. You'll just have to wait for the fixes. Sorry.
My recommendation: Wait for Confluence 2.6.1 before upgrading. You'll encounter less bugs in third party plugins because the developers will have been able to test them.
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