doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/htdocs/gnome/docs/develfaq.sgml
Gabor Kovesdan 6f0813b25d - For non-English pages generate the enbase entity, as well, not just base
- Remove inline declarations of base and enbase entities since they
  are generated automatically in autogen.ent

Approved by:	doceng (implicit)
2012-08-13 14:22:30 +00:00

172 lines
7.6 KiB
XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional-Based Extension//EN"
"http://www.FreeBSD.org/XML/doc/share/sgml/xhtml10-freebsd.dtd" [
<!ENTITY title "FreeBSD GNOME Project: GNOME Development Branch FAQ">
<!ENTITY email "freebsd-gnome">
]>
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<title>&title;</title>
<cvs:keyword xmlns:cvs="http://www.FreeBSD.org/XML/CVS">$FreeBSD$</cvs:keyword>
</head>
<body class="navinclude.gnome">
<h2>Contents</h2>
<ol>
<li> <a href="#q1">What are development versions of GNOME all about?</a></li>
<li> <a href="#q2">Should I track development versions?</a></li>
<li> <a href="#q3">How do I obtain development versions of GNOME stuff?</a></li>
<li> <a href="#q4">How do I keep everything up-to-date and in sync?</a></li>
<li> <a href="#q5">What should I do when something does not work?</a></li>
<li> <a href="#q6">How can I help with the development versions?</a></li>
<li> <a href="#q7">What is the current state of development GNOME on
FreeBSD</a></li>
</ol>
<h2>Full Text </h2>
<ol>
<!-- Q1 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q1"></a>
<p><b>What are development versions of GNOME all about?</b></p>
<!-- A1 -->
<p>The development versions are the packages released by the GNOME
project that will eventually become the stable (release) versions.
There are three working branches of GNOME development:</p>
<ol>
<li><b>STABLE</b> - The applications and libraries in the stable
branch are considered "release quality," and are the versions that
appear in the FreeBSD ports tree. The current stable version is
GNOME &gnomever;.</li>
<li><b>DEVELOPMENT</b> - In between stable releases are development
releases. Traditionally, GNOME development releases have odd minor
numbers (e.g. 2.3, &gnomedevelver;, 2.(n*2)-1). Development releases will
become stable releases, and move from alpha to beta quality during
their lifecycle. The development releases need testing by FreeBSD
users to minimize the number of surprises when the new stable
versions are committed to the FreeBSD CVS tree. This document is
about the development branch. The current development branch
is GNOME &gnomedevelver;.</li>
<li><b>GIT</b> - Often newer-than-new, the GIT master versions of GNOME
applications and libraries are alpha quality, or often completely
unbuildable. The FreeBSD GNOME project pays attention to, but
does not track the alpha quality code.</li>
</ol>
</li>
<!-- Q2 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q2"></a>
<p><b>Should I track GNOME development versions?</b></p>
<!-- A2 -->
<p>If you are looking for a stable environment, absolutely not. Please
only track the GNOME &gnomedevelver; branch if you wish to help identify bugs
and improve the FreeBSD GNOME project. You will find little
sympathy if a development-quality GNOME application eats your
homework.</p>
</li>
<!-- Q3 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q3"></a>
<p><b>How do I obtain the development versions of GNOME stuff?</b></p>
<!-- A3 -->
<p><a href="mailto:marcus@FreeBSD.org">Marcus</a> maintains a
CVS repository where all the development versions of
the GNOME components for FreeBSD are housed. Instructions for
how to check out the development ports module and how to merge it
into the FreeBSD ports tree reside on the entrance page to his
repository. Please read carefully the instructions at
<a href="http://www.marcuscom.com:8080/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi">http://www.marcuscom.com:8080/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi</a>.
</p>
<p>During the development cycle, FreeBSD-specific caveats and
other useful information will be sent to <a
href="mailto:marcuscom-devel@marcuscom.com">
marcuscom-devel@marcuscom.com</a>. If you are tracking
the GNOME development branch, you <b>must</b> <a
href="http://www.marcuscom.com/mailman/listinfo/marcuscom-devel">
subscribe</a> to this list. You should also consider <a
href="http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-gnome">
subscribing</a> to <a
href="mailto:&email;@FreeBSD.org">&email;@FreeBSD.org</a>.</p>
<p>In order to help with bug reports, be sure to add the following
to <tt>/etc/make.conf</tt> so that gdb back traces contain
useful information:</p>
<pre>
WITH_DEBUG="yes"
</pre>
<p>GNOME has an excellent guide for getting <a href="http://live.gnome.org/GettingTraces">
useful back traces</a>.</p>
</li>
<!-- Q4 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q4"></a>
<p><b>How do I keep everything up-to-date and in sync?</b></p>
<!-- A4 -->
<p>The short answer is that you need to use the <tt>marcusmerge</tt>
script to merge the development tree with the FreeBSD ports tree.
The <tt>marcusmerge</tt> script is available
<a href="http://www.marcuscom.com/downloads/marcusmerge">
here</a>, and a man page on using the script is available
<a href="http://www.marcuscom.com/marcusmerge.8.html">
here</a>. This script will merge the development ports tree
into your main ports tree. From there, you can use
<tt>portupgrade</tt> or <tt>portmaster</tt> to upgrade from
&gnomever; to &gnomedevelver; and stay up-to-date afterwards.</p>
<p>The long answer is that keeping up-to-date with the GNOME
development branch is complicated. Sometimes components change
in a way that makes <tt>portupgrade</tt> or <tt>portmaster</tt>
fail, or causes strange end results. If you plan to track the
development branch, it is a good idea to join the
<a href="http://lists.FreeBSD.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-gnome">
freebsd-gnome</a> mailing list, as well as to join the
<em>#freebsd-gnome</em> IRC channel on FreeNode
(<tt>irc.freenode.net</tt>).</p>
<p>If all of this sounds scary, or you need a desktop that
"Just Works," you should stick with the stable GNOME branch.</p>
</li>
<!-- Q5 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q5"></a>
<p><b>What should I do when something does not work?</b></p>
<!-- A5 -->
<p>It depends. If you think the problem is truly a bug with the
GNOME component, you can report a bug using <b>bug-buddy</b> or
the GNOME <a href="http://bugzilla.gnome.org">Bugzilla</a>
interface. If you think the problem lies in a FreeBSD port, or
is FreeBSD-specific, send email to
<a href="mailto:&email;@FreeBSD.org">&email;@FreeBSD.org</a>,
or report the problem on the <em>#freebsd-gnome</em> IRC
channel on FreeNode.</p>
<p>Please forward all relevant bug IDs to
<a href="mailto:&email;@FreeBSD.org">&email;@FreeBSD.org</a>
so we can keep track of known issues. Thanks!</p>
</li>
<!-- Q6 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q6"></a>
<p><b>How can I help with the development versions?</b></p>
<!-- A6 -->
<p>Now that work on &gnomedevelver; has started, we need
people to install it, and test things. If you are compiling
&gnomedevelver; by hand, be sure to build <a
href="&base;/gnome/docs/bugging.html">debugging symbols</a>.
Package users will have these symbols already.</p>
</li>
<!-- Q7 -->
<li style="padding-bottom: 0.5em"><a name="q7"></a>
<p><b>What is the current state of development GNOME on FreeBSD?</b></p>
<!-- A7 -->
<p>We have just cleared out the MarcusCom ports tree after
merging &gnomever; into the FreeBSD ports tree. Stay tuned
for the start of &gnomedevelver; work.</p>
</li>
</ol>
</body>
</html>