Re: Emdebian action plan (DRAFT!)
On Sun, 2005-11-13 at 17:17, ext Philippe De Swert wrote:
> Hello people,
>
> As some of us discussed on IRC and it also had some kind of mention on
> the mailing list it may be of use to start the discussion about some
> action plan officialy. As most of us now there has not been much
> progress the last few months as most of the "official" developers have
> been busy doing other things.
>
> Well ok, off to some plan proposal and a todo list.
>
> The plan I proposed a while ago and for which I also announced a
> scratchbox devkit :
> http://lists.debian.org/debian-embedded/2005/02/msg00013.html is pretty
> similar to what Ed Bartosh has just announced a few days ago on the
> mailing list.
> http://lists.debian.org/debian-embedded/2005/11/msg00014.html
>
> It is a what cleaner implementation of the ideas that were discussed
> earlier.
>
> So what is/was the plan? (Open for further discussion of course)
>
> Adapted Debian tools so you can build/cross-compile debian packages or
> adapted packages with an emdebian dir. (PS to Ed. Contrary to what you
> wrote in your mail you could build debian and "emdebian" packages with
> the same tools that were in the original STAG approach. The incarnation
> that can be found in the devkit I mentioned earlier can even build some
> kind of "reduced" package from the normal debian information)
Sorry, I probably missed that from your devkit.
> As it seems at the moment the scratchbox environment seems to be a
> primary target to try out these things. With the advantage that we can
> ignore some cross-compilation issues, and that the tools are easily
> usable natively too.
>
> TODO
>
> As Ed seems to have a working environment I guess we should start
> working with that and improve it on the go.
>
> Seems you got the "build base system" item finished Ed. Thanks!
>
> hmmm, and the second item "ability to build a base rootfs" too!
>
> One good thing would that he did not mention in his mail was adding
> support for ignoring packaging documentation and man-pages in the
> packages.
I removed unneeded parts after building just by 'rm -rf'-ing.
It's probably not that good solution but it's cheap and flexible enough.
> A harder thing to do is actually making sure that the docs
> don't even get build. And a way to avoid the circular dependencies that
> exist due to this documentation building tools.
>
It can be done by building in separate build tree and patching
sources before building.
Frankly speaking i don't think it should be primary goal because
it only affects amount of build tools(build-deps) and time of
build. Both are not so important, I think. At least when we're speaking
about crosscompiling.
> Set-up a buildd inside scratchbox (which should be possible as I heard
> that it has already been done) to start building more packages. (This
> will hopefully be possible when the emdebian server is back up). (Once I
> find out how to silence my proliant server I might hook it up to my
> internet line and provide a secondary build env)
>
For the first time developers can build packages without buildd, so
it's not showstopper for the project. If it's really needed I can set up autobuild
system. But I think we should fill repository with build deps for all types
of build(arm,i385,glibc,uclibc) first. After that setting up build system will be
much easier.
> Document setting up the buildd so people/devs can try it out for
> themselves.
>
> Integrate uclibc in the story. This will definitely give some size boost
> toward smaller footprint to the packages.
That's the thing! I think making uclibc arm and i386 builds must be
primary goal. I can also propose to build i386 libc packages.just
as easy task for familiarization yourself with build environment.
Other important task would be to test builds on different hardware.
BTW, if you guys don't mind using svn repository on stage.maemo.org
for further development - just let me know and I'll make commit accounts
for you. Or should we set up kind of procedure for that?
> Once we have proven that this works start pushing things into Debian
> proper.
We're far away of this at the moment, I think.
Let's have technical tasks done first.
> Optional :
> -Make sure everything works with the successors of scratchbox\
> -Check the ARM build of Ubuntu
>
> Well I hope I can open a fruitfull discussion with this and hope to see
> some more people starting to work on this.
>
I did my work with this hope, so I totally agree with you.
> Cheers,
>
> Philippe
>
> PS: I will personally make sure that people who get something well done
> on this TODO list will get some Belgian beer!
>
> --
>
> | Philippe De Swert
> |
> | GPE developer: http://gpe.handhelds.org
> | Emdebian developer: http://www.emdebian.org
> |
> | Please do not send me documents in a closed
> | format.(*.doc,*.xls,*.ppt)
> | Use the open alternatives. (*.pdf,*.ps,*.html,*.txt)
> | http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html
--
Best regards,
Ed
Reply to: