Public SourceMage Discussion List

[Andrew <afrayedknot AT thefrayedknot.armory.com>]

On Thu, Jan 04, 2007 at 11:00:16AM +0100, Mathieu L. wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 03, 2007 at 10:05:47AM -0800, Andrew wrote:
>  
> <snip>
> 
> > Bottom line. If you want a stable grimoire. Fix the bugs.
> > If you want a new stable release, Fix the bugs in the core spells. Help
> > with the release process. Run the stable grimoire, if theres a problem
> > in a spell you use, fix it. Changing around our process in arbitrary
> > whimsical ways is not going to fix anything.
> 
> I agree with all the stuff above. However here's another bottom line
> where I think Thomas is right: we simply are not enough ppl (fixing
> bugs) for this process to work properly at the moment. 
> I realize the stable-rc stage is a necessary step to ensure a minimal
> quality, but it seems to me that we (not pointing at anyone, except
> maybe me) don't work hard enough to achieve that anyway.
> 
> I just don't believe we will magically drastically increase our workload
> in the next weeks/months, and thus the stable-rc system will continue to
> sit around, killing its purpose.
> I like this system in theory and I think that's how we should work too,
> but the point is we don't. 
> 
> And I'm not suggesting we spend again countless mails discussing on that
> to design a new workflow because you're totally right in that it would
> be useless. Especially because we certainly don't want/need another more
> complex system like splitting again grimoires and such. 
> 
> So yeah, maybe temporarily dropping stable-rc grimoire, until we have
> enough ppl willing to work harder, would be the way to go if we want to
> have stable releases. Even if that means letting the current gatekeepers
> handpick only the few fixes they judge critical to be integrated in
> stable.
> 

I dont see the advantage in dropping stable-rc entirely. I do see a point
in treating stable-rc as a -rc. That is something we have not yet tried,
but is core to the release process. Stable-rc absolutely can not sit
around and become stale. its no longer an -rc at that point, it becomes
what "test" was, when we had devel, test, and stable.

How do we treat stable-rc as a -rc? Following our release process we
branch from test, figure out what spells need to work, and focus our
efforts on fixing bugs related to those spells. The breakdown occured
because we picked too many spells, and usually had only one person
fixing them.

Howerver the process is designed to work with any number of spells,
even just one. Whatever our resources can accomplish. Over time the
number of spells is supposed to grow, but the process helps make that
happen through the policy of no regressions (this is also fundamental to
the process). The work remains the same between release cycles but the
number of spells increases, and thus so does the stability of the grimoire
as a whole. Or, if resources diminish, to a point, the over-all stability
remains constant. Beyond that point the number of spells must be scaled
back again. But the system can handle those situations.

The release cycles we've tried, the only person helping fix spells was
usually seth. Nobody else. That made it difficult to have the bugs fixed
in all the spells we wanted. Also, I cant speak for seth, but I imagine
its frustrating trying to fix tons of bugs in the grimoire with no one
helping and most people version bumping spells left and right.

So, if we try the process again with a few more volunteers, and a more
realistic list of spells, we can get a new stable out in short order.

I suggest for the next round, basesystem spells only. We can make sure all
those spells work pretty easily. You can build all of them in a few hours.
I modified all of them for install-root a year or so ago in an evening.
I think its do-able. Of course if init.d isnt working, we need to either
fix it, or back it out.

The process will work, but we have to give it a chance, theres only one
way to do that, which is to do the work.

-Andrew


-- 
_________________________________________________________________________
| Andrew D. Stitt  | acedit at armory.com    | astitt at sourcemage.org | 
| irc: afrayedknot | Sorcery Team Lead       |      ftp://t.armory.com/ |
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