On Mar 1, 2012, at 11:55 AM, Bruce Dubbs wrote:
> Qrux wrote:
>
>> I'm not sure why there's so much opposition to it.
>
> There isn't opposition to testing, but who is going to do all the
> testing needed?
If we're asking buy questions, we'd also have to include some where and how
questions...Some things off the top of my head:
1) Does LFS/BLFS have dedicated machines that just constantly build LFS?
2) Can that be used to host a continuous build site (or at least one triggered
by commits...)?
3) Commit-triggered build would require something that pulls the scripts out of
the book pages and assembles them in a build-able format. Does that exist?
>> BLFS can be viewed as essentially a
>> huge piece of testing infrastructure for LFS. Why not leverage it to
>> help test? Then, when things work, by all means--go ahead with the updates.
>
> I suppose some may look at it like that.
It's just a view. I don't think that was its intended purpose. But could it
not be used for that purpose, intended or otherwise? I see reactions often as:
"well, it's never been that, and no one else thinks of it that way," rather
than: "I guess it could be that." I'm just surprised to feel that attitude.
> Change management is really difficult. Look at the reputation of KDE4
> and Gnome3. Even Ubuntu is being criticized for their latest release.
Of course. I don't think that means it shouldn't be approached.
>> A while back, I advocated breaking BLFS into (at least) 2 pieces.
>> There are core parts of system that should get tested and verified.
>
> What you are saying is coming across as "I've got this big idea that requires
> a
> lot of work -- you guys go do it." That may not be intended, but that's
> the way it sounds to me.
I hear you; you voiced that concern before (more indirectly). No, I not
necessarily saying that "Hey--you--go build a test harness." OTOH, who's
responsibility is it when there are changes of this magnitude? I understand
it's a chicken-and-egg thing. Yet, there will always be big changes, and how
can users feel confident that the changes *don't* break their systems? You
just pointed out that most people use the books as recipes to build real
systems...
It just seems that if there's no somewhat-automated-testing infrastructure,
then it's easy to say: "Hey--that's not my problem. It's not like anything
else around here gets tested like that, so why should I?"
* * *
I'm not telling anyone to do anything. I don't think I'm doing anything more
(or less) than taking the temperature for testing, and more than a little
surprised that the few times it's come up, there seems to be...I don't know
what else to call it...maybe "hesitation." And, that "hesitation" makes it
seem like it would be not worth tackling...Which just leaves big changes
between a rock and a hard place.
Q
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