[V3dot10] making and recording changes

stephane ducasse stephane.ducasse at free.fr
Fri Jan 19 12:08:24 UTC 2007


> <gripe>
> I do not usually like to complain, but I am going to do so now. There
> was no update stream for 3.9. I had to download complete images in
> order to do testing, which means that I could not easily maintain an
> image to use help for testing 3.9 updates. It required a lot of time
> and effort just to download the latest image, move things from that
> last test image into the new one, add packages that I personally
> maintain, and so forth. I did try to help, but usually it was too
> much work and not enough fun, so I did not put much time into it.
> Neither did anyone else, so you and Marcus ended up doing a whole
> lot of work without much support from other people.


Dave you could press the update button and get the packages.
It was taking time and was slow but for normal changes it worked.
Now we did a lot of changes that did not work well with MC. So the  
update
stream could not really be used. But our goal and process was really
to stick as close as possible from an update stream.
May be giving a try to MCConfiguration now would improve the speed.

> A real update stream is much better, because it permits someone like
> me to maintain a "bleeding edge" testing image and keep it up to date
> with the release stream. Any time an interesting problem shows up on
> Mantis, it is possible to work on it in the testing image and try
> out proposed fixes. That's a nice way to spend an hour or two over
> a cup of coffee.

Sure. This is not that we did not want.

> I don't care if the update stream uses change sets or something
> else, but I would really like to see an update stream again so that
> hundreds or maybe thousands of Squeak users can stay up to date and
> do their part to help with testing.

This is also why we provided image when we saw that is was too slow.
Do you imagine the amount of time it took us, because before submitting
an update item, we load it and verify and produce the script and  
reload....

> I would also add that a real update stream provides a clear,  
> documented
> record of what went into the image, when it happened, who it came
> from, and why it was done. The change sets identify their authors,
> and method changes are properly stamped with (real) author initials
> and time stamps. I cannot think of any acceptable excuse for losing
> all of this information, yet somehow that is exactly what we have
> done with our "improved" processes.

I'm sorry but MC stores this information so we have it. Now it is not  
recorded
in a CS

>
> OK, I'm done complaining.

Good. this is important to give feedback and we knew that this was not
what we wanted. But this proved that MC can be used (avi was even  
surprised that
we made it) Because squeak is more complex/badly layered and biugger  
than any single project.

So now we should learn and continue and really improve.
This is why I would like to find some times to help MC2

Stef





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