There have been many serious problems with the last few builds, to the point where it is high time to remind everyone of one of the basic tenets of software development: test your changes thoroughly before integrating them! Most if not all of the serious build-stopper problems would have been caught had the engineers in question run the changes on their desktops and laptops prior to integrating. And it's so easy with OpenSolaris' beadm(1m) and ZFS root [1].
Now, in case anyone is thinking "OpenSolaris? I thought this was the ON Nevada gate.", remember that OpenSolaris is the future, and that Nevada is going away (i.e., becoming OpenSolaris) as the extra features get merged in. So while testing on Nevada is good and encouraged, testing on OpenSolaris is even better, as it is what our customers will experience. Also, make sure your test coverage is commensurate with your changes: * If your changes for one platform affect any code used on other platforms, make sure to test them all. * Boot and suspend/resume code both tend to be fragile, so make sure to test boot & reboot (both fast and traditional) on both ISAs if your changes are exercised by any of these activities. * Do-It-Yourself Pre-Integration Testing is easy, available (internally) at http://newdiy.ireland.sun.com/cgi-bin/electron/news.cgi * Not sure which test suites to run? Ask a test sponsor for help: <ontestreview at sun.com> Finally, remember that our goal is the highest quality operating system anywhere, but as one of our gatekeepers once said "If it doesn't get tested, it tends to be crap.", so please test early and often! -- John [1] As a privileged user: # beadm create scratch-test # beadm mount scratch-test /mnt # bfu /path/to/your/archives /mnt (Wait a few minutes while bfu does its thing.) bfu# acr /mnt /path/to/your/archives (Note: if you see an entry like this: etc/init.d/devlinks upgrade_default_copy FAIL then edit /mnt/bfu.conflicts/NEW and delete etc/init.d/devlinks then run acr again with the same arguments.) bfu# ^D # beadm activate scratch-test # reboot When you finish testing, just reboot back to your original BE and your system will be none the worse for wear.
