Re: [ros-dev] June ReactOS Meeting Minutes

[Javier Agustìn Fernàndez Arroyo]

" ReactOS annual bootcamp" !!!!!!!!
+1 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


On Thu, Jul 7, 2011 at 5:58 PM, victor martinez <vicmarcal(a)hotmail.com>wrote;wrote:

>    June Meeting Minutes
>
>  2011-06-28
>  19:05 UTC
>  Fezile IRC Server, #meeting
>
>  Participants
>  =============
>  - Jan_Blomqvist_Kinander
>  - Igor_Paliychuk
>  - MfldElton
>  - Usurp
>  - Aleksey_Bragin
>  - Thomas_Faber
>  - Giannis_Adamopoulos
>  - Thomas_Faber
>  - Johannes_Anderwald
>  - Timo_Kreuzer
>  - Olaf_Siejka
>  - Jerome_Gardou
>  - Gabriel_Ilardi
>  - Andrew_Green
>  - Javier_Fernandez
>  - Victor_Martinez
>  - Amine_Khaldi
>  - Claudiu_Mihail
>  - Colin_Finck
>  - Rafal_Harabien
>  - Sylvain_Petreolle
>  - Matthias_Kupfer
>  - Danny_Goette
>  - Maciej_Bialas
>  - Ged_Murphy
>  - Ziliang_Guo
>  - Art_Yerkes
>  - Cameron_Gutman
>  - Neeraj_Yadav
>  - Herve_Poussineau
>  - Daniel_Reimer
>  - James_Tabor
>  - Olaf_Siejka
>  - Samuel_Serapion
>  - Pierre_Schweitzer
>  - Alex_Ionescu
>  - Gabriel_Ilardi
>
>  Proceedings
>  ============
>  ○ Meeting called to order at 19:05 UTC by Aleksey Bragin.
>  ○ ReactOS Project coordinator Aleksey Bragin listed the points of the
>  proposed agenda for June meeting:
>   1. Cmake switching
>   2. Next ReactOS release
>   3. Website revamp status
>   4. GSoC status
>   5. Developers status reports
>  The Minute Taker rol was given to Victor_Martinez for this meeting.
>
>  ○ Point 1: CMake switching
>  --------------------------------------------
>  ■  The ReactOS developer Timo gave a quick sum up about CMake status:
>  He reported that the CMake build is more or less ready, currently missing
>  rosapps. He stated that rosapps are not a major problem as they're rarely
>  used, and cmake files for them can be done if needed.
>  He also mentioned a problem, confirmed by Igor_Paliychuk, related to
>  booting in real hardware, in addition to the winmm:mci regression.
>  The problem detected in real hardware is very specific to the hardware
>  combination thus hard to test.
>  ■  Amine mentioned that several comparative tests have been done through
>  buildbot/testman between the rbuild build and the CMake build, showing no
>  measurable differences. He also stated that the CMake port shouldn't be
>  considered done yet, as it still lacks many planned features.
>  He highlighted some of the CMake patches,made by Jerome, to be sent
>  upstream, like the PCH support and its related dependency tracking, and also
>  the benefits of using CMake to compile ros, like the improved performance,
>  the small disk space needed for builds (half of what the rbuild builds
>  require) and the cool new kdbg features.Gabriel_Ilardi expressed his concers
>  about merging more code in the current trunk situation. Timo replied that no
>  code merge is needed,in case of switching to Cmake.
>  ■  Timo, Colin and Aleksey asked about measuring the CMake build
>  performance over the rbuild build in numbers. Jerome performed a quick
>  benchmark:
>  First test: makex ntoskrnl (all clean, toold already built). Cmake: 04:06 ,
>  Rbuild: 04:55 (17% faster)
>  Second test: rebuild (only dependencies check). Cmake: 0:28 , Rbuild: 1:04
>  (56% faster)
>  The benchmark shows Cmake is faster not only for a full compilation but
>  also recompiling (ntoskrnl) modules.
>  ■  The ReactOS Cmake Team suggested to begin using Cmake with current RosBE
>  to compile ReactOS ISOs in order to assure they are as good as Rbuild’s.
>  A "How to compile with Cmake" tutorial can be found in the following
>  wikipage: http://reactos.org/wiki/Cmake
>  Summing up, the Cmake switch will bring better dependency checking, fast
>  rebuild of single modules and much better symbols support in kdbg according
>  to the ReactOS Cmake Team
>  The technical description was left to be discussed in #reactos-dev, if
>  anyone was interested.
>
>  ○ Point 2 : Next ReactOS release
>  --------------------------------------------------------
>  ¦ReactOS release was the 2nd point of the June meeting agenda.
>
>  ■  Gabriel_Ilardi and Victor_Martinez were asked to report current trunk
>  state from Compatibility/Stability point of view.
>  Accordingly to forum threads, Bugzilla new entries, and Own testing,Gabriel
>  and Victor said important regressions have been introduced due the latest
>  changes, and mainly the LDR rewrite.
>  Wrong icons, impossibility to shutdown, AC97 hang, several installers/apps
>  failing are some of those important regressions.
>  ■  Art_Yerkes has been giving a look at the AC97 bug, he was able to gather
>  a lot of information about the regression and asks for collaboration to fix
>  it.
>  ■  Aleksey_Bragin, as the author of the LDR rewrite, stated that he knew
>  the new LDR could introduce regressions but that it is a big step forward.
>  The top priority is fixing those LDR regressions, instead of reverting, as
>  the old LDR was indeed worse.
>  Aleksey remarks that he needs every dev to take a look at the LDR bugs and
>  try to fix them.
>  The LDR regressions should be really easy to fix thanks to the rewrite, he
>  said.
>  ■  Amine_Khaldi suggested to decide when it is time to release performing
>  bugfixing and full regression testing.
>  ■  The idea of performing full regression tests now was inmediatly rejected
>  by Colin_Finck and Olaf_Siejka since bug reports are currently showing that
>  our trunk is in a really bad shape. Due to this, the Release discussion will
>  be on hold until the next meeting.
>  During this month ReactOS devs are suggested to focus in bugfixing mainly
>  the LDR code.
>  As these bugs are critical and able to hide other minors regressions, a
>  special call is being made:
>
>  ****************Special Call****************
>  "Please pick a bug from the linked ones in
>  http://reactos.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=6346 "
>  ****************Special Call****************
>
>  ○ Point 3 : Website Revamp Status
>  -------------------------------------------------------
>  ¦ Thanks to Colin's help, a new playground with correct permissions and
>  tied to an SVN branch has been created.
>
>  ■  Niski and aross, main webrevamp developers, have been focused on
>  Bugzilla and Mediawiki integration, compatdb drupal port, and forum.
>  Forum will have new features as "the best answer" and "karma" modules
> which
>  will improve forum users experience.
>  ■  Niski has completed the work on Bugzilla and Mediawiki while aross is
>  working on compatdb and the new forum.
>  ■  Right now, Amine said, a design/layout work is needed in parallel.
>  ■  Colin_Finck stated that finding a designer among ReactOS developers is
>  more difficult than findind a developer so he offered himself to help with
>  the design/layout.
>
>  ○ Point 4: Gsoc status
>  -------------------------------------------------------------------
>  ■   AndrewGreen is currently cleaning a mixture of explorer_new, atl com
>  and browseui code. The resultant code will be commited afterwards.
>  Although he recognizes his project is behind schedule, after apologizing he
>  says he’s confident to meet the goals by midsemester evaluation.
>  Ged_Murphy cpp shell32 code will allow him to use atl com for everything
>  shell related.
>  Colin_Finck and Olaf_Siejka discussed the best way to test the new
>  implementation to check for any possible regressions, due to the fact that
>  Ged was not around the discussion was postponed.
>  Jerome_Gardou asked Andrew about the WINE Shell32 Gsoc project but
>  accordingly to Olaf, Wine has refused to cooperate regarding those.
>  Status: Behind Schedule.
>
>  ■  Giannis_Adamopoulos was too busy with exams so his project was parked a
>  little. His commits will raise up when the last exam is done.
>  Status: On time
>
>  ■  Claudiu_Mihail thanked the great help of Cameron_Gutman and Art_Yerkes.
>  The project is set to meet the deadlines for midterm.
>  There are still two problems remaining: browsers don't work(it will be
>  solved by midterms), slowness of the lwIP implementation.
>  He has followed the test approach using several simple test apps and fixing
>  revealed bugs.
>  After finishing his thesis project, which is highly related to his Gsoc
>  project,he will start commiting again.
>
>  ■  Neeraj_Yadav has divided his sound project in 5 parts.
>   1.[Finished] Writing a skeleton server which can hold the audio converter
>  modules and the mixer modules ...This server should be capable of insertion
>  in the reactos audio chain [4 weeks]
>   2.[Now] Writing mixer modules [2 weeks]
>   3.Writing audio converter  [ 4 weeks]
>   4.Inserting this audio server in the reactos audio chain [1 week]
>   5.testing/styling/documentation [1 week]
>   He expects to finish the 2nd step in midterm evaluation.
>   Alex_Ionescu and Giannis_Adamopoulos asked for a way to test Neeraj code.
>   If anyone is interested, this is the best way:
>   1)make audsrv && make audclient
>   2)run audsrv -n  in one console
>   3)run audclient in other
>   4)open as many audclients as you want
>   5)the server should play a mixed sound
>  Status: On time
>
>  ■  Thomas_Faber is finishing the main framework needed to run the tests.
>  Most of the old tests have been ported and now he is currently working on
>  getting special-purpose drivers and usermode test parts up and running.
>  Lately he has been quite busy with a university project but he expects to
>  commit the framework in these days.
>  Status: On time
>
>  ■  Timo_Kreuzer has finished the font driver loading and now he is working
>  on the font mapper, which is complex and needs a good design.
>  Status: Ahead of time
>
>
>  ○ Point 5: Developers status reports
>  -------------------------------------------------------------------
>  ■  Alex_Ionescu will help Aleksey commit his scater/gather DMA patch.
>  ■  Alex_Bragin is working on remaining LDR code and afterwards he'll take
>  part in processing bugzilla patches.
>  ■  Amine_Khaldi is focused in cmake and the website revamp.
>  ■  Art_Yerkes made some improvements to symbol handling in the cmake branch
>  and now he’s working with Claudiu.
>  ■  Colin_Finck has been trying the KDUSBCOM idea (KD DLL for debugging over
>  an USB-to-Serial adapter), and he’s moving now to help with the website
>  layout.
>  ■  Daniel_Reimer is playing with Gcc builds and updating RosBE.He added
>  Cmake support a while ago and he is still battling with GCC 4.6 and Wine RC
>  files.
>  ■  Gabriel_Ilardi is focused in mantaining Bugzilla and the forum and he’s
>  performing some testing in his few spare time.
>  ■  Ged_Murphy is helping with shell32 c++ fixup
>  ■  Herve_Poussineau is currently inactive on ReactOS
>  ■  James_Tabor is still working on bug report issues.
>  ■  Jan_Blomqvist_Kinander will move the Fezile server to the concrete
>  bunker creating a LAN behind Fezile to get automated tests on real hardware.
>  ■  Johannes Anderwald will work in HID (Human Interface Devices for USB)
>  support during the summer, a hard task as it is completly undocumented.
>  ■  Maciej_Bialas is working on mediawiki integration for the new revamped
>  site.
>  ■  Matthias_Kupfer has been bugfixing and commiting some patches.
>  ■  Pierre_Schweitzer has no time nor willingness right now. Once time will
>  be back,he'll invest it in his summer student.Once willingness will be back,
>  he'll keep on his current ReactOS work and help with the ReactOS
>  infrastructure
>  ■  Olaf_Siejka is waiting for Aleksey to finish the LDR code so he can team
>  up with him to solve the remaining issues of sysreg4. After finishing the
>  utf-8 resource conversion, he will get more involved in testing. He will
>  also help with the hardware testbot from the buildbot side.
>  ■  Sylvain_Petreolle is working on French translations.
>  ■  Timo_Kreuzer is working on MSVC builds fixing several bugs that prevent
>  ReactOS to reach the desktop.
>  ■  Victor_Martinez has finished his exams recently and now he’s preparing a
>  forum team to test the revision before the LDR rewrite and the one after it,
>  this way it'll be easier to find regressions. Also he will help with the
>  revamp webpage.
>
>  ○ Point 6: Suggestions
>  ---------------------------
>   ■  Jan_Blomqvist_Kinander suggested to create a ReactOS annual bootcamp
>  with devs, testers and fanatics plus having a look at SAMBA 4 - ROS port
>
>  ○ Meeting closed at 22:08 UTC by Colin Finck on behalf of Aleksey Bragin.
>  ○ Minutes written by Víctor Martínez.
>  ○ Reviewed by Amine_Khaldi, and Gabriel_Ilardi
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  Ros-dev mailing list
>  Ros-dev(a)reactos.org
>  http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
>