The 2.9-beta release is scheduled for 18 February so plan to get any commits you want in 2.9.0 merged on master before this date.
Important dates:
4 March: Release candidate 2.9-RC1 and creation of 2.9.x branch
18 March: Stable release 2.9.0
See: https://github.com/geoserver/geoserver/wiki/Release-Schedule
Kind regards,
--
Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@anonymised.com>
Director
Transient Software Limited <http://transient.nz/>
New Zealand