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Date:      Thu, 14 Jun 2001 15:54:36 -0400
From:      "Antoine Beaupre (LMC)" <Antoine.Beaupre@ericsson.ca>
To:        freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: OT: rendered copies of RelnotesNG in the tree (was: RELNOTESng problems)
Message-ID:  <3B29167C.3000008@lmc.ericsson.se>
References:  <200106121443.KAA18844@world.std.com> <3B2637CA.9050803@lmc.ericsson.se> <200106121629.f5CGTZF27955@bmah-freebsd-0.cisco.com> <3B265047.4060605@lmc.ericsson.se> <200106130352.f5D3qvB37402@bmah-freebsd-0.cisco.com>

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Bruce A. Mah wrote:

> If memory serves me right, "Antoine Beaupre (LMC)" wrote:
> 
> 
>>>How does the Web-available versions differ from putting the TXT 
>>>rendering in the repository?  
>>>
>>
>>Not much. But one might like to consider the idea of having the TXT 
>>files *implicitly* available along the source code (bundled), instead of 
>>as a "foreign" reference on a website. I can see many situations where 
>>one could not have access to the web but only acces to the local machine 
>>which contains the source code.
>>
> 
> I'm trying to picture someone tracking -STABLE (for instance) but not 
> being able to pull down a Web page...CTM users are the only group of 
> people who come to mind, potentially.


Yes. Or a remote machine placed beyond a few levels of firewalls/proxies. :)


>>Another thing which crosses my mind: when someone installs a RELEASE, 
>>the relnotes TXT/rendered versions come with it and are installed as 
>>part of the install process, right?
> 
> No, actually I don't think the release documentation gets installed...it
> stays on the install media.  Someone correct me if this is wrong...


I would be nice to make sure. Actually, it depends on the presence of 
these files in the "src" distro, I guess. :)

> I confess that I haven't done a sysinstall for about a year. 


A year? Much more than that! ;)

> cvsup/make world doesn't touch these either (I know that for sure).


Ditto.

>>>The Web versions will (once the Web 
>>>Gods make a couple of commits) get built as frequently as the Web site 
>>>is.
>>
>>That's about once a day, if I'm not mistaken?
> 
> I *think* it's twice a day for the main server; don't know about the 
> mirrors.


Then that's good.

>>How technically feasable would it be to have the TXT files rebuilt on 
>>the fly, after a commit on the related .sgml file?
> 
> I don't know of any easy way to do this.  The problem is that the *.TXT 
> rebuild requires running a process (OK, a bunch of processes) that may 
> or not produce successful output.  It's a lot for the CVS server to 
> have to handle, and we can't very well require this on the CVS clients.


You're right. Having this on a cvs[up] server would be totally 
mad/inappropriate. :) Building the release notes is now a pretty heavy 
activity!

 
> You didn't suggest this, but in case someone *else* thinks of it, no, 
> we'll never have a policy of requiring manual commits of *.TXT 
> renderings.


Well I kinda suggested that in some way, since there's not really 
another alternative. But I guess it's zeroed out now.

>>>In the meantime, you can look at the version on my Web page.  They're 
>>>updated pretty often, on an unofficial basis.
>>
>>Assuming I have access to the web. :) That is of course considered 
>>irrelevent nowadays, but I find that still a considerable requisite to 
>>have access to notes so tightly integrated (or relevant? I miss the 
>>proper word) to the source... These things should all be bundled together.
> 
> I think "integrated" is the word you mean.


Bundled. It should be the same package.

 
> If I only had intermittent net access, and I couldn't build the release
> documentation locally, I'd do a fetch on the Web site at the same time
> as a cvsup of my sources.  Probably done with a script.  Not the most
> well-coupled solution, I realize:
> 
> 	#! /bin/sh
> 	cvsup -g -L2 path/to/my/supfile
> 	fetch http://www.freebsd.org/path/to/relnotes.txt
> 	fetch http://www.freebsd.org/path/to/hardware.txt
> 	fetch http://www.freebsd.org/path/to/install.txt
> 	fetch http://www.freebsd.org/path/to/readme.txt
> 	fetch http://www.freebsd.org/path/to/errata.txt


Yah... We should really have a centralized/official "process" regarding 
that. er.. We do, actually. :) This could be put in the "update" target 
of the make world makefiles!

>>Actually, the release notes are *implicitly* out of date, since we have 
>>no formal/automated system of updating the relnotes when a major change 
>>is made. AFAIK, there is someone (you, Bruce?:) that updates them by 
>>watching cvs-all, but that is also an out of date process.
>>
>>OTOH, putting the TXT files in the repository would also add to the delay.
> 
> It's usually me who writes these things.  It'd be nice if more
> developers wrote their own release notes though.  gshapiro is actually
> really good about doing release note commits at the same time as his
> source commits.


Good job. :)

Regards,


Antoine


--
La sémantique est la gravité de l'abstraction.

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