Just fishing for ideas here, I have a few of my own but wanted to see if anyone else had any feedback.

In Pods 2.0, we have an entirely revamped set of tables for performance and simplicity benefits. The upgrade path I was looking at seems to mean that upgrading to 2.x from 1.x would stop any Pods-specific functionality from working on a site using Pods, until the 2.0 upgrader can run, which means there is a button an admin has to click.

How do we communicate with users on how the upgrade process works, before they click upgrade in the WP update screen itself?

Should we consider setting up a new plugin on wp.org that would be separate, so you could install 2.0, it would guide you through upgrading, then automatically deactivate the old Pods plugin.

Or are there other options here? We have to think long term, because anything we do in 2.x has to have that same upgrade path available, for users or projects who have not yet been able to upgrade for whatever reason.