Fwd: Re: IcedTea build instructions

[Dr Andrew John Hughes]

On 18:50 Mon 10 Oct     , Jiri Vanek wrote:
> On 10/06/2011 06:28 PM, Andrew Haley wrote:
> > On 10/06/2011 04:17 PM, Omair Majid wrote:
> >> On 10/06/2011 06:07 AM, Andrew Haley wrote:
> >>> Indeed.  But the question is still not answered.  What shall we tell
> >>> people to do?  IMO, check out the latest release, which is
> >>> icedtea6-1.10.3, or checkout the latest release branch.  I can see the
> >>> arguments for both.  But telling people to checkout -r icedtea6-1.10
> >>> is pretty stupid, IMO.

Agreed, but this is probably just because the page hasn't been updated
since 1.10 branched.  There's a lot of duplication around.  The primary
source for release information is the release announcements e.g.

http://blog.fuseyism.com/index.php/2011/07/21/icedtea6-1103-released/

The wiki should just point at the latest one, rather than duplicating
all the information.

The current wiki page seems to prioritise Mercurial checkouts for this
when really this is extra work only needed for developers.

I'd suggest just documenting the latest release tarballs on the front
page and having a separate page on how to get into developing IcedTea.
This tends to be the standard used by other project sites I've visited
in the past e.g. GCC has just a note on
http://gcc.gnu.org/releases.html which leads to a separate page about
SVN usage.

> >>>
> >>
> >> It may also be dangerous if the icedtea6-1.10 release contains known
> >> vulnerabilities that are patched in a later release.
> >>
> >> Given the choice between the latest release or the latest release
> >> branch, I am tempted to go with the latter. The latest release branch
> >> should only contain bug fixes. Given that the wiki may not be always up
> >> to date, it may, for a short while, link folks to an older release after
> >> a new release has been announced. I think it would be safer to point
> >> people to the latest release branch.

I tend to agree.  That would also require less maintenance work.

> >
> > I think so too.  The only problem is that people might end up with a
> > bug that no-one else can reproduce.  However, it's where I'd go for
> > the most stable IcedTea release.
> >
> >> FWIW,
> >> http://icedtea.classpath.org/wiki/ReleasingIcedTea#Post-release_updates
> >> says that the person doing the release should update the version on the
> >> main wiki - though I am not sure if they are referring to the version on
> >> the hg command or something else.
> >

It's referring to the 'Getting IcedTea' section IIRC.

> > I don't think that matters because what's there right now is obviously
> > wrong.
> >
> > Andrew.
> 
> According to this thread, I would like to suggest attached patch to icedtea wiki:
> 

> --- qs-orig	2011-10-10 17:53:17.682736881 +0200
> +++ qs-me	2011-10-10 18:47:51.980786002 +0200
> @@ -1,20 +1,38 @@
>  == Quickstart & Building ==
>  
> -First either download a released version of IcedTea6 or obtain it from the Mercurial repositories.  With a Mercurial checkout, you must first generate the autotools machinery.
> +First either download a released version of IcedTea6 (http://icedtea.classpath.org/download/source/) or obtain it from the Mercurial repositories.  With a Mercurial checkout, you must first generate the autotools machinery.

That link is already in the section above.

> +Newest released icedtea is: http://icedtea.classpath.org/download/source/icedtea6-1.10.3.tar.gz
> +Please be careful when dealing with versions. Here comes small explanation:
> +IcedTea6 is always versioned as icedtea6-X.Y.Z, and so is named directory in downloaded tarbooll, but when cloned from repository, the name is always icedtea6-X.Y (except bleeding edge where it is called just icedtea6)
> +X - is currently 1, and probably will remains 1 for aeons
> +Y - is version of release. Release is done when some big change is done, or some goals are accomplished. In this moment repository is branched, and all branches need to be handled individually.
> +  Currently maintained branches  are 9 and 10. When new branch is released, then it is named icedtea6-X.Y (as Z is equals to zero and so it is not written)
> +Z - is minor release upon branch. It is done when security issues occur or considerable amount or branch-specific issues or back ports  occur.
> +  Currently latest released icedteas6 are 1.9.9 and 1.10.3
>  
> - hg clone -r icedtea6-1.10 http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea6-1.10
> - cd icedtea6-1.10
> - ./autogen.sh
> +Before getting icedtea, you should be decided what do you want to do with it.
> +1) All released (and by minor release updated) tarbools or branched (and tagged) repositories  (hg clone -r icedtea6-X.Y.Z http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea6-X.Y (please note individual Xs and Ys should be same, in case of Z=0, ignore Z)) should be stable - but only maintained ones have all latest security updates. Please note, that repository cloned using -r, is, and must remains read-only
> +   This You will use (probably with highest available X.Y.Z) when you want to use icedtea. You will use lower then highest X.Y.Z probably only when digging for some really strange bug or removed feature 
> +2) All releases have also their still unreleased heads. This you can obtain only from mercurial repository (hg clone http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea6-X.Y). This are going to be in next minor release (means next update of this release)
> +   This repositories are read/write, but fixes belonging here should be only really release specific or very important and therefore back-ported from head.
> +3) For a bleeding-edge version of IcedTea6, use http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea6 (the next major release) or http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea6-hg (works against the OpenJDK6 Mercurial forest) instead.  For IcedTea7, use http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea .
> +   This is probably very unstable, but also is most flexible and most updated and is dedicated for most of bug fixes and enhancements. 
>  
> -For a bleeding-edge version of IcedTea6, use http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea6 (the next major release) or http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea6-hg (works against the OpenJDK6 Mercurial forest) instead.  For IcedTea7, use http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea.
> + hg clone ... whatever you have decided
> +//highest stable release is:  hg clone -r icedtea6-1.10.3 http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea6-1.10
> +//highest probably stable release is:  hg clone http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea6-1.10
> +//unstable head is: hg clone http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea6
> +
> + cd icedtea6(-X.Y)
> + ./autogen.sh
>  
>  To build IcedTea:
>  
>   ./configure
>   make
>  
>  Additional instructions are also available for [[DebianBuildingInstructions| Debian]], [[FedoraBuildInstructions| Fedora]], [[RhelBuildInstructions| RHEL 5.x]] and [[GentooBuildInstructions| Gentoo]]. These may be outdated.
>  
>  A full list of required packages is available at [[BuildRequirements]].  [[CommonIssues]] lists some of the problems you may encounter in building IcedTea and their solution.  Note that JAVA_HOME should be unset before attempting to build IcedTea.
>  
>  Any bugs found should be filed in our [http://icedtea.classpath.org/bugzilla bug database].

I think we should be *reducing* the amount on the front page to the minimum required to download and build,
with clear notification of what the latest releases are.  More detailed information should be on other pages
linked from there.

Is there any way of getting this wiki to pull in the RSS feed from my release blog to avoid duplication and
ensure that this page is always up-to-date?
-- 
Andrew :)

Free Java Software Engineer
Red Hat, Inc. (http://www.redhat.com)

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