-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1
I'm reading through the directions that Korosh wrote up about his start
and I'm not sure that building from CVS is the right way to go.
CVS HEAD and V_3.-4 are on bleeding edge. Much better to stick with the current or latest binary drops.
It has been my experience that the more steps you put between getting to know an application and running the application the fewer people take interest. Downloading, versus building, seems a bit easier, not to mention less error prone given that the CVS code will have more unknown bugs than a release with known issues.
I agree.
So I was going to suggest picking, and then linking to DPML.net, the distribution of Merlin we want people to use. The "current" symlink here : http://www.dpml.net/merlin/distributions/?M=D points at the 3.0 version. Since I see two revs (3.1, 3.2) more, I'm assuming that this may be a bit dated, but I don't know. Latest looks like a better option, but that may be too cutting edge.
Here's the official DPML policy concerning "current" and "latest":
Current
http://dpml.net/merlin/distributions/current/ This contains the Avalon PMC endorsed last official release. I.e. its the current official version that has been pushed through all of release process and voting stuff.
Latest
http://dpml.net/merlin/distributions/latest/ This is a sym link to the latest reliable binary drop. Distributions under latest are tested and validated before posting, but they are not formal Avalon distributions, and may or may not be endorsed under a community vote. Generally speaking its safe to run against the latest binaries and in fact doing this helps in that we get feedback from a broader community as we converge on formal releases.
I guess I'm looking for the version is being supported and suggested. I'm assuming it's 3.2 by the docs here : http://avalon.apache.org/merlin/starting/installation/index.html
As of about 30 mains ago "latest" is linking to http://dpml.net/merlin/distributions/3.2.4
If so, should we remove the links to the older version(s)? And why aren't the downloads being hosted on Apache's site?
Votes are taken on the release of product. Anyone can vote are are encouraged to do so. Committer votes are binding with respect to calculation of quorum and majority. Publication on www.apache.org/dist is subject to a separate vote of the PMC (a vote to publish).
The last PMC vote-to-publish was for the 3.0 release. The 3.2.4 latest is a candidate that will be the subject of a community vote within the next few days. Assuming that passes and nothing dramatic occurs relative to the 3.2 branch, a vote to publish will be raised on the PMC list. If that vote passes then the "current" link on DPML will be redirected to 3.2.4 and the 3.2.4 binary and related jars will be published on Apache's distribution site.
Also, what's the reasoning for suggesting Merlin over other containers?
It has a future. (and its a really nice product - but I'm biased)
~ Currently, the wiki here : http://wiki.apache.org/avalon/AvalonFAQ has a link to "Woah! So many containers! Which should I use!" and that links to the Container FAQ : http://wiki.apache.org/avalon/AvalonContainerFAQ Which, amongst alot of other data, does have a section on which container to choose. Since we're trying to just introduce people to Avalon, and I assume we recommend despite it's "beta nature" (according to the Container FAQ), what are the reasons for that? I'd like to include a little blurb about why, but it's not crucial.
IMO the entire subject of "alpha", "beta", "final" status is really too simplistic. If we consider the Merlin system it has been rock-solid with respect to the container <--> component contract for a long time. In this respect it is "final" status and has been for several months.
Another view of a container is the embedder <--> container contact and in this case we are talking about people who are putting the Merlin system inside their own application (which is a couple or more orders of magnitude less that the number of component developers). On this contract the Merlin system is "beta" status. Our objective is to move to a final API under 3.4.
Anyway, I'm folding this all into the AvalonForBeginners node, so any data you've got will be helpful.
To get a good idea of what Merlin offers to the component developer its is worth reading though the tutorial pages. They are not long and give you a reasonably good idea of what Merlin does.
http://avalon.apache.org/merlin/starting
I'm also going to throw in a note about "INSTALL THE MERLIN PLUGINS INTO MAVEN" since that bit me as well as another guy in just the past few days.
It's something that's bugging me as well - I'm actually playing around with the idea of dealing with this at install time and upgrade of the maven system automatically.
Cheers, Stephen.
--
|------------------------------------------------| | Magic by Merlin | | Production by Avalon | | | | http://avalon.apache.org/merlin | | http://dpml.net/merlin/distributions/latest | |------------------------------------------------|
--------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
