Editing Task:PR1.2 autobuilder

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== Background ==

After the PR1.2 SDK was released, Niels deployed it to the autobuilder; enacting a plan which was discussed on this list. This has caused problems with libhildon dependencies, but the problems aren't just limited to that library [http://lists.maemo.org/pipermail/maemo-developers/2010-March/025668.html].

Both Niels and the Council believe we should do something to assist.

== What we should do ==

We *need* to do something, both to improve the situation in [[extras-devel]] and [[extras-testing]] today, and test an approach for the next upgrade.

The main requirements here are, I think:

* It's not an excessive amount of work
* It's a viable long term strategy
* The QA process doesn't get broken

Thoughts and comments from developers, or anyone else with a idea,
will be much appreciated.

== Progress ==
 
Fremantle autobuilder has been switched to the Squeeze devkit; idea [[#Use the improved dpkg-shlibdeps]] has been implemented. [http://lists.maemo.org/pipermail/maemo-developers/2010-April/025870.html] [http://lists.maemo.org/pipermail/maemo-developers/2010-April/025905.html]. -- 21:50, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

== Options ==

=== Deploy SDKs as they are released; treat -devel and -testing as trunk ===

This is what we have now, I think we can say it doesn't work if there's going to be more than a few days between SDK release and device upgrade. Since Nokia doesn't pre-announce release dates, and last minute bugs could cause problems; I think we can rule this one out.

=== Revert the builder ===

This is basically a step backwards. "Changing the builder config is easy. Cleaning up -devel and rebuilding the affected packages is quite some work as we don't have any scripts for that made yet."

=== Hack the SDK, create some kind of hybrid ===

This'd be bad enough if limited to just libhildon, but isn't viable and WILL cause unforeseen problems. Veto :-)

=== Create separate repos, build queues for pre- and post-1.2 ===

Similar to what's been done for Extras proper. "Creating the repos will be about a day work, but the part that sits on top of that (management scripts, Packages interface, QA queue) will probably take a week of work."

There are hard issues around QA here.

=== Try building in each SDK in turn ===

My suggestion; when someone uploads to "fremantle" auto-builder it attempts to build the package against the PR1.1 SDK. If it succeeds, it goes into Extras-devel. If it fails to build, it gets built with the PR1.2 SDK, and so on.

For an app with compile time symbol resolution (e.g. C/C++), this'd handle both cases quite nicely. Python apps would have to depend on the specific versions of bindings which gave them the features they wanted - again, not too much of a problem.

At extras(-stable) promotion time you could even decide, based on actual binary package dependencies, whether to put in fremantle-1.2 or both fremantle-1.2 & fremantle extras repos. This would fix another common complain, "what if I don't upgrade for a few weeks".

Larger packages could be prevent from being tried to built twice by stating a forced build dependency on a PR1.2 version of any system package.

Some software won't install from -devel and -testing as it does now, but that will be reduced to the set of software which is actually using features that are unavailable. A HAM patch could grey out applications which were uninstallable, or show some other indication.

This is, effectively, reinventing the more intelligent [http://wiki.debian.org/Projects/ImprovedDpkgShlibdeps dpkg-shlibdeps].

However, it deals with the following three circumstances:

#Application uses API which has changed in later SDK. This will be built with PR1.1 SDK, succeeds and goes into Extras-devel. Can be promoted to Extras-testing but there's no clear way for a tester to know it won't work if their device is running the latest OS.
#Application uses API which is unchanged in later SDK. This will be built with PR1.1 SDK, succeeds and goes into Extras-devel. Can be promoted to Extras-testing and tested on any device with PR1.1 or PR1.2. Once promoted it COULD go into fremantle and fremantle-1.2.
#Application uses API which is introduced in later SDK. This will be built with PR1.1 SDK and fail. It will    be rebuilt with PR1.2 SDK, succeed and go into Extras-devel. Can be promoted to Extras-testing and tested by testers using the most recent release. Once promoted it will go into fremantle-1.2.

=== Use the improved dpkg-shlibdeps ===

This is a big topic and as such might require more careful consideration, but seems way more future proof than the rest of options.

Stuff that would need to be done:
#Add the debian-squeeze devkit to the autobuilder. At this point I don't know if it's usable, or not. The Lenny devkit does not contain dpkg-shlibdeps.
#Ensure required .symbols files are in the SDK. We could either
#*Fix upstream. Make them generate .symbols files, make them use the updated devkit. Probably impossible for PR1.2.
#*Ship symbol files ourselves in an external package. A bit ugly, requires maintenance.

A nice added benefit is that we get updated debhelper in the SDK, and more Debian compatibility; might be worth to push.

==== Initial testing ====

There will be a temporary autobuilder with the debian-squeeze devkit installed where we will experiment with .symbols files. We have thrown a few packages to it with no visible problems so far; if someone thinks his package might break when built under a newer Debian tooling please say so before it breaks.

.symbols file generation is currently being done externally, using the publicly released library binaries and dpkg-gensymbols. A sample PR1.2 libhildon1 .symbols file looks like [http://depot.javispedro.com/nit/syms/libhildon1.symbols this], and will be placed in /etc/dpkg/symbols/ .

=== Case-by-case basis ===

Developer complains: add a temporary exception to autobuilder to build
$APPNAME with PR1.0/1.1 SDK, but goes into the shared extras-devel as
now.

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@@ Line 75: / Line 75: @@
 #*Fix upstream. Make them generate .symbols files, make them use the updated devkit. Probably impossible for PR1.2.
 #*Ship symbol files ourselves in an external package. A bit ugly, requires maintenance.
-#Put the built packages into a common -devel repo, or specific -devel-1.0 and -devel-1.2 repositories?
-#If single -devel & -testing repositories, decide whether to put packages in -1.0 or -1.2 at -stable promotion time.
-Some cons:
-*Just enabling debian-squeeze devkit in autobuilder might cause problems. Need to check on that. Might need testing.
-*Need to ensure that local SDK installations can replicate the autobuilder setup. This means debian-squeeze devkit, and .symbols files have to be distributed.
 A nice added benefit is that we get updated debhelper in the SDK, and more Debian compatibility; might be worth to push.

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Editing Task:PR1.2 autobuilder