Ross Boylan <RossBoylan at stanfordalumni.org> wrote:

> My question concerned the svn repository and revision, as well as the
> use of VMMaker.  I was under the impression that the appropriate code
> for some platforms, including *nix (excepting Mac OS X), needed to be
> retrieved from a separate location than the main sources.  Is that
> impression incorrect?
Very. The whole point of having an SVN repository is that all the
sources for all the platforms (barring some old, or unsupported or just
not harvested yet) should be in one place.

> 
> Also, even if the code is in one spot, a particular revision might
> work for some platforms and not others.
That might end up being true in accidental cases (ie total fuckups) but
is not supposed to be so. Remember - the entire point of doing the VM
as substantially Slang and having a setup like the SVN repo is that the
system is portable. 

> 
> Finally, on VMMaker itself, I was focused more on the packaging. A
> .mcz file is for Macs, I think.
Where did you get that strange idea from? .mcz is a Monticello package
file, platform independent and usable on any machine with MC. How would
I be able to produce a Mac specific weirdo file given that I develop on
RISC OS? I don't even have XCode on my pBook or pMac - and given what
I've seen of it I doubt I ever will. It's a classic case of software
gone mad.

> I count at least 4 components: VMMaker, the out of image source code,
> the VM, and the image.  Maybe with the latest packaging the in-image
> interpreter/source code makes a 5th component.
No, 4. The VMMaker package includes all the standard Slang classes.
Actually 3 - you should consider the image and any vm that will support
it as a single item.

> 
> It's not obvious to me what combinations are appropriate.  I'm also a
> bit fuzzy on where to get them.
Cataloguing exactly what image and release of VMMaker go together is
likely impossible. Generally, the latest version image with the latest
VMMaker is good but sometimes - like now - we are in the middle of
complicated work and it gets delicate. That's why the official release
is Squeak 3.8, VMMaker 3.8b3 and SVN 1105. I don't like the
complication but unless someone wants to pay me fulltime to keep it
cleaner and simpler we have to live with it occasionally. 

> The first sentence makes sense on general terms, but I'm not sure what
> these two sentences refer to.  Maybe it's just saying that, for any of
> the 4 or 5 components listed earlier, it won't work with arbitrarily
> old versions of the other components?
Of course. One can put immense amounts of effort into maintaining
backwards compatability but at some point it's time to break and make a
quantum jump.

> I'm guessing the reference to
> java is a joke, but I'm not sure.
java is always a joke. 
Java programming is like teenage sex ....

	-Everyone talks about it all of the time (but they don't really
know what they're talking about);
	-Everyone claims to be doing it;
	-Everyone thinks everyone else is doing it;
	-Those few who are actually doing it:
		-Are not practicing it safely;
		-Are doing it poorly, and
		-Are sure it will be better next time."

tim
--
Tim Rowledge, tim at rowledge.org, http://www.rowledge.org/tim
Strange Opcodes: FART: Fill Accumulator from Result if True