Upgrading visualvm/netbeans
Hi,
few days ago I tried to analyze a big Java heap dump using visualvm.
It occured to be impossible with visualvm 1.3.3 from Debian package -
took days to find anything. But it worked really good using separately
downloaded visualvm 1.3.5. So I vacantly submitted a bug (wishlist) to
upgrade Debian package and even volunteered to help...
After downloading sources, I see that it's not going to be easy. I've
got to main questions:
1. Debian visualvm is based on IcedTea visualvm harness. The last
visualvm version supported by IcedTea is actually 1.3.3. Should I
pursue with IcedTea to get them support 1.3.5 first? Probably it's
possible to make small changes to force it build 1.3.5, but upgrading
upstream first seems a better idea...
2. Visualvm requires NetBeans platform. The latest NetBeans version in
Debian is 7.0.1. The latest one available at this time is 7.3.
Visualvm 1.3.5 requires 7.2.1, there are also other intermediate
version available - 7.1, 7.2. What should be the policy when upgrading
netbeans? Should we try to debianize latest version? For native
libraries sometimes you can have multiple version installed (eg.
libboost), but it can't be done with single source package. Also, why
is the package called eg. libnb-platform13-java - where does 13 comes
from?
I'm not sure if working on such a huge package as NetBeans is a good
starting point for a beginner. There's a wishlist also for upgrading
NetBeans (http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=673606),
but it looks like this attempt died so far...
Regards
Paweł
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