Clarify which Camunda versions are supported, unsupported, no longer maintained

[ev-codes]

Problem

As a user, I want to know what versions of Camunda are currently supported so I know how long I can expect to receive support for that version.

It's unclear to me:

• what versions are currently supported (Announcements seems to be the best place, but I found this difficult to find, and I'm not sure if this is kept up-to-date)
• what versions are unsupported
• what versions are "no longer actively maintained" - there seems to be some inconsistency between the version selector (screenshot 1) and the callout at the top of the 8.1 home page (screenshot 2)

Potential solution(s):

• Update the version selector (screenshot 1) so that 8.1 is considered an unsupported version
• If "no longer actively maintained" and "unsupported" mean the same thing, consider aligning this version
• Adjust page content to make "Supported Versions" more clear to SEO and human browsers. Perhaps a new Supported Versions page would be helpful here?

I'm happy to make small code changes, but it's unclear what the best path forward would be here 😄

[akeller]

Thanks for the feedback @ev-codes! There are a few things going on here that are not super obvious.

@pepopowitz is actively archiving the latest unsupported versions of Camunda 8 and Optimize. You can follow the progress here. He may chime in with more info as our DRI of docs infra.

We move unsupported versions to separate static doc sites and then adjust the dropdown. We only index the current version (non-version URL), and we take great pride in carefully monitoring our SEO.

But it sounds like you are looking for something more - clearer indications about what versions are supported. Oddly enough, this isn't something we did on docs.camunda.org (the dropdown... err drop...up? 😆 is just a list of all versions ever), and I haven't heard much feedback on this experience being confusing.

[ev-codes]

@akeller you're welcome, thanks for your quick reply!

It sounds like most of my points are being addressed or are addressed by your extra context, thank you 😄

One thing I'd love is to look up "camunda supported versions" on any search engine and find a page that, at a glance, shows me the supported versions (and perhaps how long they'll be supported for). In other terms: a condensed version of the "Announcements" page.

As a developer, a lot of tools I've used have a version of this page.

Some examples of what I mean:

• https://tomcat.apache.org/whichversion.html
• https://www.oracle.com/java/technologies/java-se-support-roadmap.html
• https://nodejs.org/en/about/previous-releases
• edit - another example: https://docs.pega.com/bundle/keeping-current/page/keeping-current/kc/extended-support-policy.html

You and your team are the experts, and I'm probably not the most representative sample 😆 . I just wanted to clarify the "something more" I was looking for 😄

[akeller]

Hmm... maybe we can add this to the release policy page or the top of the announcements page 🤔 and maybe with a variable list or something we don't need to remember to update.

Good thinks to think about. Thanks @ev-codes!