[M3devel] new cm3 release (was: Help finding CM3 compiler for Linux?)

[Olaf Wagner]

Quoting Randy Coleburn <rcoleburn at scires.com>:

> I agree about needing a new release.

I suggested a new release twice within the recent two years, but
nobody seemed to really support that idea. I never got round to do
the work myself.

> I suppose there is some value in maintaining a MINimal size binary   
> distribution, but I think it would also nice to also provide a FULL   
> distribution with everything pre-built.  (Of course, this will eat   
> up more space on elego machines.)

That should be no problem.
As for archive size, I think disk sizes and transfer rates have
changed much in recent years. We could easily provide full distribution
archives in binary form. For those who just want the compiler, I'd
suggest something of the size of the core set as defined in the script.

> I have ready access to Windows XP (32-bit and 64-bit) and Vista   
> platforms.  I would be glad to build and supply the distros for   
> these platforms.

Great.

> Suggest we agree upon a plan and a timeframe.
> a.  make a tag or something in CVS that marks what will comprise the  
>  official sources for the release

I can take over the CVS and pinging work, if everybody agrees.
I won't have time to actually build and test all distributions.

> b.  agree upon distribution format (platform naming conventions,   
> compressed archive format for MIN and FULL variants)

I'd suggest a switch to the complete binary archive format; but we
need to automate and document the process. probably Jay has already done
most of it, but I haven't tested it.

> c.  get a list of who is going to supply distros for which platforms
Elego can provide FreeBSD 6.X and Linux on AMD64 easily.

> d.  establish procedure for how the distros will be uploaded to elego
We should simply start by collecting release candidates in the
uploaded-archives section of the server. We can use a naming scheme
to separate these from other archives (cm3-*-*5.7.1-rc[1-9]?).

> e.  set a date for contributors to have the distros uploaded

> f.  have someone put together the web page showing links to all the   
> distros along with updated installation instructions

I can do that, too, if you like.

> One sticky issue in the past has been target location.  If we unpack  
>  a distro and put it in a different place in the filesystem tree, we  
>  don't want it to break.  I know that cminstall attempted to adjust   
> the cm3.cfg file to deal with location differences.  Do we need/want  
>  to build an installer program or script to deal with this issue,   
> perhaps even adjusting cminstall will suffice?  Or, do we give a set  
>  of instructions on which file(s) to edit when moving the install   
> location?

I think Jay's archives can be easily relocated.

> For Windows, I don't mind building an installer.  Perhaps the   
> installer could let you choose whether to install the MIN or the   
> FULL version.
>
> Also, I think the Tinderbox has been great, but perhaps it can be   
> improved.  I know I would like to see testing for Windows platforms   
> added.  I have an XP computer I can pretty much dedicate to this   
> task.  The problem is that I tried with Olaf's help to get it   
> working, but there were too many dependencies on unix-type   
> shell/script environment, and trying to force fit into cygwin didn't  
>  work well for the native Win32 implementation.  Thoughts?

I had working most of it, but then got lost in other work again,
and the virtual machine I used was so slow (and tended to crash :-/)
We need to start again from where I stopped.

> Regards,
> Randy
>
>>>> Mika Nystrom <mika at async.caltech.edu> 4/1/2009 6:25 PM >>>
>
> Actually I think that the thing that has caused me the most problems
> in the past is that the -min and the -src-all get out of sync, since
> the binary bootstrapping dists are often not distributed (for size
> reasons?) with full source archives from exactly the same date.  So
> when you try to build src-all with the binary bootstrap, something
> goes wrong.  It's the whole... ok I need a binary install (since
> it's a real compiler), but now I have to bootstrap everything.  And
> then the bootstrap turns out not to be 100% compatible with the
> compiler sources, libraries, some little detail in m3tk, ...

If you are happy with just overwriting everything existing, it should
be no problem to switch to full binary archives.

Olaf
-- 
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