Byzantium Live Distro Prerelease

Prerelease Process

DRAFT On this page we have a list of things that need to happen between the final build and the publishing of software or repackaging thereof by the Byzantium Project. Unless otherwise stated all items are required to be satisfied for an individual build before being placed in another part of the project or before publishing the project.

Build Environment

• manifest check - make sure what you think is there is actually there. manifest files (with name <scope>.manifest) are recommended, and will be checked by the build environment once that is automated.
  • Add a stanza to the Makefile (if we go that way, that is) - make manifest or make test or something like that.
• ?other sanity checks?

Runtime Environment

• for each package/major feature set a checklist must be made that will reasonably ensure the software is behaving as expected.
• A list of packages that comprise 000-byzantium.xzm should be maintained someplace. Right now we're just eyeballing it.
• A list of files associated with each package should be maintained someplace.
  • This is why I build Slackware packages (where feasible) or do a DEST=/tmp/SBo make install where there aren't any followed by a dir2xzm /tmp/package.xzm /tmp/SBo - to keep all of the files for a particular package grouped together.
  • A bunch of .xzm packages are easier to keep track of than compiling stuff in sequence. Then, when it comes time to build everything the build system can check them out of SVN and use xzm2dir to unpack all of them in sequence into a fakeroot. So, I propose a two step QA sequence:
    • Make sure that some_package-rev.isi.on.xzm was compiled and checked into SVN.
    • Make sure that some_package-rev.isi.on.xzm was checked out of SVN on the build machine and xzm2dired into /tmp/fakeroot.
  • the checklist can (and is recommended to) just say to run a script that will do the required tests and return a pass/fail status.
  • if a script is used for runtime QA it should be named "runtimeQA.sh" and have 777 (a+rwx) permissions in the root directory of it's scope (eg for a package "byzantium-repo/packages/thispackagedir/runtimeQA.sh"). Also it should use paths with the expectation that the script will be run from an arbitrary directory.

Human Environment

• 2 day cool down period between building and publishing
• No .iso image goes out without being PGP signed against key 0xD6975C17.
  • While we're at it, can we get some more signatures on that key?
    • Fingerprint 93F3 8B13 B52C D8F0 FA8D 03B3 37AA 847C D697 5C17
    • I've uploaded it to a bunch of keyservers around the Net.
• The person who builds the .iso image is not the one who checks the contents of the .iso image. After you've been staring at the same thing for long enough, it all starts looking alike.
  • Does the bootloader have the right porteus.cfg?
  • Does the bootloader have byzantium.jpg handy?
  • Does porteus/modules/000-byzantium.xzm exist?
  • Do these files exist in the root directory of the .iso image?
    • README.txt
    • README.NOW
    • FAQ.txt
    • packages.txt
    • CHANGELOG
  • Do all of the Porteus modules exist in porteus/base?
    • 000-kernel.xzm
    • 001-core.xzm
    • 002-xorg.xzm
    • 003-lxde.xzm
    • 004-kde.xzm
    • 005-kdeapps.xzm
    • 006-koffice.xzm
      • Do we really need to include this?
    • 007-devel.xzm
    • 008-firefox.xzm
• No .iso goes out without being tested, i.e., at least booted in a VM and put through its paces.
• We need a process for loading the mirrors from a single distribution point.
• Torrents are seeded prior to announcement.