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Date:      Wed, 28 Apr 1999 23:49:12 -0600
From:      Nate Williams <nate@mt.sri.com>
To:        Richard Levenberg <richard_levenberg@securecomputing.com>
Cc:        J_Shevland@TurnAround.com.au, java@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Can I help with the JDK2 port?
Message-ID:  <199904290549.XAA13046@mt.sri.com>
In-Reply-To: <99Apr28.174919pdt.26883@bohica.con.securecomputing.com>
References:  <99Apr27.110733pdt.26882@bohica.con.securecomputing.com> <3727A01C.6535E10@TurnAround.com.au> <99Apr28.174919pdt.26883@bohica.con.securecomputing.com>

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> I appreciated your comments and was surprised at Nate William's reply. I
> gave him the benefit of the doubt and assumed that I had missed
> something on the website (http://www.freebsd.org/java). I went back to
> look for something like an anonymous CVS, or something that I could just
> look at and decide for myself whether I was capable and had the time. I
> still havent found anything. 
> 
> Given what I have heard about SUN allowing ports it is not as simple as
> "here's the source have at it."

That's correct.  You need a license in order to look at the sources.

> But obviously someone has access to it and might have already gone
> through it a little bit and made a task list.

Nope.  It's like writing a compiler.  Either it works or it doesn't.
Right now, there's essentially *nothing* of significance that has been
done.

> I work that way sometimes and sometimes I just go through it
> sequentially. Either way I just thought I would offer some time since I
> know there must be hundreds of us wanting the port for FreeBSD.

Agreed.

> Also from reading what I could find at blackdown
> (http://www.blackdown.org) I gather that there is a fair amount of
> testing requiring human observation. I am human and have made a few
> observations in my time so I would be willing to do this as well.

Great.  But, when nothing has been done there's nothing to observe.

I'm not trying to be obnoxious here, or even difficult.  There is
*NOTHING* at all done.  There is no beta code to test, there is no
patches to try out, there is *NOTHING*.

If you want something, then go download the JDK2 sources and start
hacking, and you'll be further than anyone else is that I'm aware of.

> Anyway I don't know anything about Mr. Williams and reserve judgement.

I'm the guy that makes the Java1 releases, and am the 'facilitator' for
the Java1 porting team.  I'd also like to think that anyone who was
doing a Java2 port would try to work with the Java1 team since we have
the most experience doing the work so far, and all I can say is that
nothing has been communicated to me of any significant work on Java2.

So, again I say there is no task list, no code to test, no features that
need added other than 'all of them'.

If you want to help, go ahead and download the sources and start working
on making a FreeBSD Java2 port.  If you aren't comfortable doing that,
then you can wait until someone else does it, but I wouldn't hold my
breath since it hasn't happened yet, and everyone who has the ability
hasn't had the time to do much.


Nate

ps. I'm still trying to get the JDK1.1.8 sources, but Sun screwed up the
distribution tarball I got, and haven't responded to my subsequent faxes
for a fixed tarball.

pps. We (the Java porting team) are hoping that the Linux diffs will be
released which should help us bootstrap the porting effort.  In essence,
because we are all short on time, waiting for the Linux diffs will make
it that much easier to 'optimize' the amount of time required to make
the Java2 port happen.


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