[etoys-dev] Alpha release image (was Re: Etoys: GetText-Richo.3.mcz )

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 25.05.2010, at 11:20, David Corking wrote:
> 
> Korakurider wrote:
> 
>> p.s  having alpha release image would make sense if updating is such
>> troublesome !
> 
> Bert posted a couple of images that seem to meet this description at
> http://etoys.squeak.org/download/

Indeed. 

However, those are development versions. An alpha release would be set up for end users. And ideally be produced by a regular build process.

Also, updating a clean image should be no problem - it would be pretty much equivalent to downloading a newer dev version. I see these checkpoint versions rather as a time saver because updating takes less time. But we also need them to get new auxiliary files. At least until we re-vitalize the subversion repository.

> They are made by hand, and there is no guarantee of regular
> replacements.

That's true :)

>  (An automatic build host would have failure modes that
> are similar to the update button.)

Not quite - the update button does two things. First it loads all the actual updates posted. Then (after asking) it loads all the latest packages. The latter is a little less safe than the former, because more screening goes into releasing something to the update stream. So the updates from the stream are (hopefully) "safe" checkpoints, and alpha releases should only be built from those IMHO.

Having a build server would be awesome though, it would take out a lot of hassles of doing the actual release later ...

- Bert -