Thanks for getting back to us. Looks like we should be able to get rolling
on FreeBSD binaries in fairly short order. :-)
At 06:20 PM 7/8/99 -0700, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote:
>> 1. A designated maintainer who'd be willing to commit to resolving
>> FreeBSD-specific issues, if any. The core team is pretty swamped right
now,
>> so this needs to be someone new.
>
>Actually, this depends entirely on the amount of time required. If
>it's just a few hours a week, we've got a few spare cycles. I'd be
>willing to take this on myself, in fact. I've been known to help
>Applix with porting their product to FreeBSD, why not yours? :)
That should work out just great. So long as the product is being regularly
built on FreeBSD, I wouldn't expect many FreeBSD-specific issues to surface.
Having to run on so many platforms helps keep us pretty honest in XP code,
and to date we haven't run into very many Linux-isms -- at least not that I
know of.
>> 2. Information on the de facto standards for user-friendly packages,
>> installs, and uninstalls on FreeBSD systems -- preferably in the form of
>> patches. (Effectively enough to make sure that the FreeBSD version is as
>> easily installed as the other platforms. This is likely to eventually
>> include porting our graphical setup program to GTK, although that's
unlikely
>> to have any FreeBSD-specific ramifications.)
>
>It would probably be easiest for me to just make a "package" target
>for whatever FreeBSD-specific makefile or makefile macros you use.
>The FreeBSD package system is more than a little arcane, but I'm
>reasonably familiar with it given that I'm also the author. :)
That sounds perfect. To get started, take a look at the following portions
of the source tree:
abi/src/Makefile
abi/src/config/platforms/freebsd.mk
abi/src/config/platforms/linux.mk
abi/src/config/platforms/win32.mk
Essentially after 'make' has built all the targets and 'make canonical' has
arranged them into a canonical layout, the 'make distribution' step dives
into a platform-specific subtree, where all the packaging work happens:
abi/src/pkg/$(ABIPKGDIR)
All your stuff would go in a peer directory here (called, say, freebsd).
If you have more detailed questions, Jeff and Shaw did most of the original
packaging work, and Darren Benham is in the process of replacing the current
rpm-via-alien hack with the necessary native Debian tools.
>> 3. A preconfigured machine to add to our build farm. :-)
>
>Can you give me some idea as to the specs desired for this? We might
>be able to scratch something up. Where do you also want it sent, or
>would it live here on our network?
Nothing fancy -- unless you want to slake Shaw's machine lust. :-) As for
where, see:
http://www.abisource.com/contacts.phtml
Essentially we just want a box that's already configured to build and run
AbiWord reliably without taking eons to do so, which also has an ethernet
card so we can put it on the net. I know nothing about the usual desktop
environment on FreeBSD, but a current GTK/GLIB install would be nice.
The goal is that within hours after it arrives, Jeff or Shaw can give it an
IP number, add our automated build system tools and start cranking out
builds.
Paul