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date Mon, 13 Aug 2007 08:56:04 +0200
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47:11c6df210d7f 48:56c54cf7c5b6
1 -*- mode:outline; minor-mode:outl-mouse -*-
2
3 * Introduction
4 ==============
5
6 You are running an experimental version of XEmacs. Please do not
7 report problems with Beta XEmacs to comp.emacs.xemacs. Report them to
8 xemacs-beta@xemacs.org.
9
10 ** XEmacs Beta Mailing List
11 ===========================
12
13 *** Subscribing
14 ---------------
15
16 If you are not subscribed to the XEmacs beta list you should be. Send
17 an email message with a subject of `subscribe' (without the quotes) to
18 xemacs-beta-request@xemacs.org and follow the directions. You do not
19 have to fill out the survey if you don't want to.
20
21 *** Unsubscribing
22 -----------------
23
24 To unsubscribe from the list send an email message with a subject of
25 `unsubscribe' (without the quotes) to xemacs-beta-request@xemacs.org.
26
27 *** Administrivia
28 -----------------
29
30 The XEmacs beta list is managed by the SmartList mailing list package,
31 and the usual SmartList commands work. Do not send mailing list
32 requests to the main address (xemacs-beta@xemacs.org), always send
33 them to xemacs-beta-request@xemacs.org. If you have problems with the
34 list itself, they should be brought to the attention of the Mailing
35 List manager Chuck Thompson <cthomp@xemacs.org>.
36
37
38 ** Beta Release Schedule
39 ========================
40
41 The URL ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/beta/README always contains the best
42 estimate of when the next beta XEmacs will be released. For weekend
43 betas the release time is generally in the vicinity of 2PM to 5PM US
44 Pacific Time (Universal Time minus 8 hours). For weekday betas, the
45 release time is generally in the vicinity of 8PM to Midnight US
46 Pacific Time on the listed day.
47
48 While 19.15 and 20.x are in parallel development, a simultaneous
49 release day implies a release of 20.x first, followed a few hours
50 later by 19.15.
51
52 Betas are nominally a week apart, scheduled on every Saturday.
53 Midweek releases are made when a serious enough problem warrants it.
54
55
56 ** Reporting Problems
57 =====================
58
59 The best way to get problems fixed in XEmacs is to submit good problem
60 reports. Since this is beta software problems are certain to exist.
61 Please read through all of part II of the XEmacs FAQ for an overview
62 of problem reporting. Other items which are most important are:
63
64 1. Do not submit C stack backtraces without line numbers. Since it
65 is possible to compile optimized with debug information with GCC
66 it is never a good idea to compile XEmacs without the -g flag.
67 XEmacs runs on a variety of platforms, and often it is not
68 possible to recreate problems which afflict a specific platform.
69 The line numbers in the C stack backtrace help isolate where the
70 problem is actually occurring.
71
72 2. Attempt to recreate the problem starting with an invocation of
73 XEmacs with `xemacs -q -no-site-file'. Quite often problems are
74 due to package interdependencies, and the like. An actual bug in
75 XEmacs should be reproducible in a default configuration without
76 loading any special packages (or the one or two specific packages
77 that cause the bug to appear).
78
79 3. A picture can be worth a thousand words. When reporting an
80 unusual display, it is generally best to capture the problem in a
81 screen dump and include that with the problem report. The easiest
82 way to get a screen dump is to use the xv program and its grab
83 function. Save the image as a GIF to keep bandwidth requirements
84 down without loss of information. MIME is the preferred method
85 for making the image attachments.
86
87 * Compiling Beta XEmacs
88 =======================
89
90 ** Building an XEmacs from patches
91 ==================================
92
93 All beta releases of XEmacs are included with patches from the
94 previous version in an attempt to keep bandwidth requirements down.
95 Patches should be applied with the GNU patch program in something like
96 the following. Let's say you're upgrading XEmacs 20.4-beta10 to
97 XEmacs 20.4-beta11 and you have a full unmodified XEmacs 20.4-beta10
98 source tree to work with. Cd to the top level directory and issue the
99 shell command:
100
101 $ gunzip -c /tmp/xemacs-20.4-b10-20.4-b11.patch.gz | patch -p1
102
103 After patching check to see that no patches were missed by doing
104 $ find . -name \*.rej -print
105
106 Any rejections should be treated as serious problems to be resolved
107 before starting compilation.
108
109 After seeing that there were no rejections, issue the commands
110
111 $ ./config.status --recheck
112 $ make beta
113
114 and go play minesweep for awhile on an older XEmacs while the binary
115 is rebuilt.
116
117 ** Building an XEmacs from a full distribution
118 ==============================================
119
120 Locate a convenient place where you have at least 100MB of free space
121 and issue the command
122
123 $ gunzip -c /tmp/xemacs-20.4-b11.tar.gz | tar xvf -
124
125 (or the simpler `tar zxvf /tmp/xemacs-20.4-b11.tar.gz' if you use GNU
126 tar).
127
128 cd to the top level directory and issue an appropriate configure
129 command. The maintainer uses the following at the time of this
130 writing:
131
132 ./configure --with-offix --with-mule=yes --with-dialogs=athena3d \
133 --cflags="-m486 -g -O4 -fno-strength-reduce -malign-loops=2 \
134 -malign-jumps=2 -malign-functions=2" --with-sound=no \
135 --with-xface=yes --error-checking=all --debug=yes \
136 --with-scrollbars=athena3d \
137 --with-canna=yes --with-wnn=yes --wnn-includes=/usr/X11R6/include/wnn
138
139 Save the output from configure that looks something like:
140 Configured for `i586-unknown-linux2.0.28'.
141
142 Where should the build process find the source code? /usr/src/xemacs-20.0
143 What installation prefix should install use? /usr/local
144 What operating system and machine description files should XEmacs use?
145 `s/linux.h' and `m/intel386.h'
146 What compiler should XEmacs be built with? gcc -m486 -g -O4 -fno-strength-reduce -malign-loops=2 -malign-jumps=2 -malign-functions=2
147 Should XEmacs use the GNU version of malloc? yes
148 Should XEmacs use the relocating allocator for buffers? yes
149 What window system should XEmacs use? x11
150 Where do we find X Windows header files? /usr/X11R6/include
151 Where do we find X Windows libraries? /usr/X11R6/lib
152 Compiling in support for XAUTH.
153 Compiling in support for XPM.
154 Compiling in support for X-Face headers.
155 Compiling in support for GIF image conversion.
156 Compiling in support for JPEG image conversion.
157 Compiling in support for PNG image conversion.
158 Compiling in support for Berkeley DB.
159 Compiling in support for GNU DBM.
160 Compiling in Mule (multi-lingual) support.
161 Compiling in support for OffiX.
162 Using the Lucid menubar.
163 Using the Athena-3d scrollbar.
164 Using the Athena-3d dialog boxes.
165
166 Then type make and you should have a working XEmacs.
167
168 After you have verified that you have a functional editor, fire up
169 your favorite mail program and send a build report to
170 xemacs-beta@xemacs.org. The build report should include
171
172 1. Your hardware configuration (OS version, etc.)
173
174 2. Version numbers of software in use (X11 version, system library
175 versions if appropriate, graphics library versions if appropriate).
176 If you're on a system like Linux, include all the version numbers
177 you can because chances are it makes a difference.
178
179 3. The options given to configure
180
181 4. The configuration report illustrated above
182
183 5. Any other unusual items you feel should be brought to the attention
184 of the developers.
185
186 ** Creating patches for submission
187 ==================================
188
189 When making patches you should use the `-c', or preferably if your
190 diff supports it, `-u'. Using ordinary diffs like this are
191 notoriously prone to error (and this one won't in fact work, since
192 I've already applied a patch to this file so the line numbers probably
193 don't match up any more).
194
195 $ diff -u old-file.c new-file.c
196
197 -or-
198
199 $ diff -c old-file.c new-file.c
200
201 Also, it is helpful for me if you create the patch in the top level of
202 the XEmacs source directory:
203
204 $ diff -u lwlib/xlwmenu.c~ lwlib/xlwmenu.c
205
206 I prefer patches to be accompanied by an update (either a raw entry or
207 a patch) to the appropriate ChangeLog file, but it is not required.
208
209 Also note that if you cut & paste from an xterm to an XEmacs mail buffer
210 you will probably lose due to tab expansion. The best thing to do is to
211 M-x cd to the appropriate directory, and issue the command `C-u M-!' from
212 within XEmacs.