On 12 October 2013 17:55, Rob Weir <robw...@apache.org> wrote: > On Fri, Oct 11, 2013 at 12:10 PM, janI <j...@apache.org> wrote: > > Hi. > > > > FYI: as I informed a while ago, I made a project proposal for OSU > capstone. > > > > The project has been selected, so we will have 4 students working the > next > > months to achieve the following: > > > > http://eecs.oregonstate.edu/capstone/viewproposal2013.php?id=16 > > > > extract from above: > > > > motivation: > > "Apache OpenOffice is the biggest open source office package, with 65 > > milllion downloads of our last version. A number of other open source > > packages are derived from OpenOffice, and incorporates patches and > > enhancements from AOO. > > The AOO source code is very big, 121 languages, 233 modules and 2933 > > makefiles (including sub-makefiles). As programming platform, we use C++ > > (bulk part), Java, Python, Perl and some special libraries > > The build system is old, a combination of perl and dmake, and has grown > > over the years into a non standard, hard to understand non documented > > system. > > At the same time, we want to attract more developers, therefore we want > to > > make a new build system based on modern technology, which are easy to use > > especially for windows developers." > > > > goal: > > "The goal is to: > > 1) make a build system suitable for use with microsoft visual studio > > 2) make a build system suitable for use on linux (makefiles) > > One of those systems should be the primary one and the other one should > be > > automatically generated. > > The team must first understand how the current system works in general, > and > > then build scenarios how a \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"perfect\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" system > > would look like. > > Second task is to implement it, in parallel with the existing system > > Third task is to help test it on the different platforms we support. " > > > > > > I will mentor the students, but hope that the community will be behind me > > and help as well. If the students turn out to be motivated they can, as > > volunteers and committers, be a real bonus for the project. > > > > > This is very cool. Thanks for applying and making this happen. > > It is a big task, but improvements to the build system would be a big > benefit to the project. > > One question: When you say "microsoft visual studio", did you mean a > build fully integrated into the IDE? Or where you thinking more of a > command-line build that could be invoked as a command line tool, using > Cygwin and the VC++ compiler? > > It depends of course on the students, but I have made some tests (feasibility studies), and my goal is
to have 1 solution consisting of n projects (1 pr module), and totally integrated in the IDE, removing the need for cygwin shell. We of course still need a lot of the cygwin tools (like flex), I would integrate those with the "custom build option". If we can achieve that (in parallel with the current build system), I believe (BUT I might be wrong) that extending the projects with makefile information and generating the makefiles is simple (using e.g. XALANC). But I do not want to raise too high expectations, with the state of the current build system, nearly any enhancement will be beneficial. To be honest, the team and I will need help from some of the more knowledgeable committers in the community. > I would not be of much help on the technical side of this, but as the > project makes progress perhaps I can help publicize the > accomplishments via a blog interview or something similar. > Thx, all help is appreciated, even hand holding when nothing works :-). OSUSL is the biggest Apache site (infrastructure) and this project is the only apache project selected, so we might see interest from the apache community as well as our own community. I am not marketing, but maybe an interview with the students (and if needed also me) on the expectations would be a good idea, to sort of announce it broader ? rgds jan I. > Regards, > > -Rob > > > Another apache committer who lives close to the OSU have promised to help > > me as well. > > > > I am aware there are very different ideas about how a new build system > > should look like, but lets use this possibility to get moving, if the > > result works it cannot be less "nice" than the current system. > > > > are anybody with knowledge of build.pl etc. interested in helping out ? > > > > rgds > > jan I. > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@openoffice.apache.org > For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@openoffice.apache.org > >
