[V3dot10] Gamma?

[Keith Hodges]

nicolas cellier wrote:
> Sure, if you want to release, you must stop including corrections at a
> moment or another.
> There is no urge, these changes are for small bugs and can wait 3.11,
> though most are lightweight.
> What i ask is that they be reviewed by someone else than me, that's all.
>
> Cheers.
>
> Nicolas
Hello Nicolas,

I have just recently announced the "Level Playing Field" initiative, you
may have seen the mail on squeak-dev.
Some of us use lots of different squeak versions on different projects.
This initiative aims to get all of these versions using the same tools
for installing code unattended.

There are various slots available for doing things to prepare an image
automatically, primarily installing things, but also unloading, cleaning
up things visually, posting readme's and other common tasks. Slots are
currently scripts embedded in pages in the installer wiki, in the future
they will also be methods in a class, as part of the "Bob" the builder tool.

In addition to the basic "LevelPlayingField" scheme there are additional
functions which can be performed, for example, "Clean", "Tidy", and
"Test". There is also another called "Latest".

The theory goes as follows:

"Latest" itself has more sub-slots, one called "Fixes" and another
called "Upgrades" for package upgrades.
If you or I run (from the command line)...

#: squeak 3.10gamma.image http://installer.pbwiki.com/f/LPF.st Installer
user=unstable do=Latest SmalltalkImage save=Squeak3.10.1alpha.image +quit

Then all of the fixes and upgrades listed on the page
http://installer.pbwiki.com/Fixes-Squeak3:10beta-unstable will be loaded
as part of the LevelPlayingField "Latest" process. They can be reviewed
and if they pass inspection/testing then we can move them into the
stable "Fixes-Squeak3:10" slot

Testing scripts may be invoked via (not implemented quite yet)
#:squeak Squeak3.10.1alpha.image Installer do=Test

When the 3.11 initiative begins, the fixes will already be in place
ready to be applied to the release process. I think that the "Fixes"
slot should be divided into minor and major, major being things which do
not load straightforwardly into the image. Minor fixes will likely be
retained for 3.10.1, Major fixes will need better tool support, namely
the all important atomic loading which is part of MC1.5 and DeltaStreams
work but is not yet ready for use with traits.

In order for your fixes list to be incorporated with this scheme each
mantis report needs to have installer code embedded into it. This code
tells installer which of the uploaded files is to be used in order to
apply the fix. The code is of the form...

"fix begin"
Installer mantis bug: 1234 fix: 'filename_of_fix.cs'.
"fix end"

This can then be invoked by running.

Installer ensureFix: 1234. or
Installer ensureFix: '1234 and some descriptive text'.

the page Fixes-Squeak3:10beta-unstable then has the above embedded in it
using the <code st> ...</code st> tags.
<code st>
Installer ensureFix: 1234.
</code st>

It would be great to have your fixes to start off the 3.10 level playing
field "Latest" process and we can use this to test the process out.
I propose that every month or so we seek nominations from
tester/reviewers as to which of the unstable fixes are ok to be made stable.

the password for http://installer.pbwiki.com/ is predicably "squeak".

Another thing I would recommend is hanging out on irc channel #squeak...
there are lots of folks there actively involved in testing new things
out and your contribution would be welcomed.

best regards

Keith