Hi Dan & co.
Bruce's question about change sets and your response reminded me to ask about change set preambles. Because the change set preamble often contains more information about the feature or fix that was included into the mainline than the comments in the actual code, I think that some important information is lost when the change sets are purged from new images. Over the last year, for example, we have had hundreds of change sets, for a variety of features, that have imparted key information about the features they introduced/fixed/replaced.
Is there an archive of change set preambles that can be accessed by the Squeak community?
Thanks.
---==> Chris
PS> I included the rest of the Squeak community on the list because I think all of us would be interested in such a repository.
Hi Dan & co.
Bruce's question about change sets and your response reminded me to ask about change set preambles. Because the change set preamble often contains more information about the feature or fix that was included into the mainline than the comments in the actual code, I think that some important information is lost when the change sets are purged from new images. Over the last year, for example, we have had hundreds of change sets, for a variety of features, that have imparted key information about the features they introduced/fixed/replaced.
Is there an archive of change set preambles that can be accessed by the Squeak community?
Yes, and no, again.
There is certainly an archive of all the changesets -- on the update server itself -- and most of them have preambles.
One could probably just start up a 2.0 image and let it update for a few days until it got to 2.7alpha. Then you could run the code that appears in the comment to ChangeSet summaryString (something like that), and it would produce a digest of all the preambles.
More importantly, IN THAT IMAGE, you could use all the nice Squeak queries such as 'changeSets including this method', or 'changeSets with conflicting defs'. This would be more useful than an archive. Perhaps someone feels like doing this and putting the image out on a server as 'archival.image'.
Anyway, if you seriously want that kind of documentation, that's what I would do. I frequenlty use an image that dates back to update 900 or so for that purpose.
- Dan
Dan wrote:
One could probably just start up a 2.0 image and let it update for a few days until it got to 2.7alpha. Then you could run the code that appears in the comment to ChangeSet summaryString (something like that), and it would produce a digest of all the preambles.
More importantly, IN THAT IMAGE, you could use all the nice Squeak queries such as 'changeSets including this method', or 'changeSets with conflicting defs'. This would be more useful than an archive. Perhaps someone feels like doing this and putting the image out on a server as 'archival.image'.
Anyway, if you seriously want that kind of documentation, that's what I would do. I frequenlty use an image that dates back to update 900 or so for that purpose.
Only to be safe: Includes an 'official' Squeak2.6 image _all_ changes on the change server before?
Some other questions: - Are the change sets on the update server checked against each other for eventually conflicts? - How and when comes an [FIX] from this mailing list to the update server? - How and when comes an [UPDATE] from this mailing list to the update server? - Do some or all [ENH] changes belong to updates on the update server?
If there is a location where all these question are answered it would be helpful.
Greetings,
sr (stephan.rudlof@ipk.fhg.de) "Genius doesn't work on an assembly line basis. You can't simply say, 'Today I will be brilliant.'" -- Kirk, "The Ultimate Computer", stardate 4731.3
Stephan Rudlof wrote:
Only to be safe: Includes an 'official' Squeak2.6 image _all_ changes on the change server before?
Yes, but the changes file is normally condensed for each "official" version release, so previous versions of methods will be lost. A full sequential update from way back will retain the previous versions of everything in the changes file.
Some other questions:
- Are the change sets on the update server checked against each other for
eventually conflicts?
- How and when comes an [FIX] from this mailing list to the update server?
It is looked at and checked by someone at Squeak Central -- sometimes the [FIX] is modified, extended, or done in a different manner before being released (if the [FIX] is actually just fixing a symptom of the real problem, SC will normally ignore the patch and do the real fix). Most (all?) fixes will eventually go by Dan for at least final QC before being released as an [UPDATE]. Very few [FIX]s sent to the list will come from SC -- if they do a fix they will normally just put it into the update stream.
- How and when comes an [UPDATE] from this mailing list to the update
server?
All [UPDATE]s are issued by Squeak Central and announced on the list. The [UPDATE]s originate both from internal work done at SC and from selected [GOODIE]s, [ANN]s, [FIX]s, and [ENH]s sent to the list after SC has at least QCed them.
Dan covered the internal process at SC in some detail in an email to the list a few months ago.
- Do some or all [ENH] changes belong to updates on the update server?
[ENH]s sent to the list almost always come from Squeakers at large and are not (initially) part of the [UPDATE] stream. Again, enhancements done by SC will normally just be put into the update stream if they are deemed worthy after some use and experience at SC. Whether an [ENH] sent to the list becomes an [UPDATE] depends on a number of things -- here SC applies their experience and judgement to make the decision. Sometimes one person's [ENH] is another's [YUCK!]. ;-)
-- Dwight
Only to be safe: Includes an 'official' Squeak2.6 image _all_ changes on the change server before?
Yes, the official 2.6 image is almost exactly equal to 2.0 with every update since then. There are some differences, such as tweaks to the Play With Me windows.
Some other questions:
- Are the change sets on the update server checked against each other for
eventually conflicts?
They are full of "conflicts" in that most of the updates overwrite previous defs. We are fairly careful to do the right thing when merging changeSets.
- How and when comes an [FIX] from this mailing list to the update server?
Generally someone from Squeak Central reviews it, possibly tweaks it, and releases it internally. Then every week or so, I broadcast all accumulated internal updates to the external servers.
- How and when comes an [UPDATE] from this mailing list to the update
server?
I post the [UPDATE] summary after the above process.
- Do some or all [ENH] changes belong to updates on the update server?
I'm not sure what you are asking. Not all [ENHancements] get promoted to the server, though many do. Sometimes we at SC decide against an enhancement, and sometimes we just don't have the time to perform appropriate adaptation or integration.
Hope this helps
- Dan
squeak-dev@lists.squeakfoundation.org
-
Dan Ingalls -
Dwight Hughes -
Norton, Chris -
Stephan Rudlof