4.11 Release Requirements Branching

[Nick Withers]

On Mon, 2014-01-13 at 16:35 +0100, Ralf Corsepius wrote:
> On 01/13/2014 01:48 PM, Sebastian Huber wrote:
> > Hello Joel,
> >
> > some notes regarding your list:
> >
> > The following are things that MUST be resolved before 4.11 is branched:
> >
> >
> >      Tools stabilized on known versions
> Primary issue to me: Newlib's lack of API/ABI stability.
> 
> To many changes. That said, I do not see any perspective for an RTEMS 
> release unless there are, say at least 2 months without newlib receiving 
> RTEMS-related changes.
> 
> In case somebody wonders, why I haven't upgraded newlib in my toolchain 
> packages: The churn the RTEMS submissions are causing have become 
> unprocessible to me.
> 
> >          Looks impossible to have all tools on same GCC version.
> Correct.
> 
> IMO, it's time to pull the plug out of some targets.

Since it's (sort of) come up...

Personally, I really like FreeBSD's concept of "Tier 1" et al.
architectures
( http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/articles/committers-guide/archs.html ).

So a Tier 1 RTEMS BSP would build all tests, have active maintenance (at
least for the architecture), have remote GDB support, all board devices
supported (or those not supported explicitly stated, at least) and other
documented attributes.

Perhaps then some of the less supported architectures could be kept but
it'd be nice and clear to potential users looking for a platform that
these aren't the go - or require a significant investment of time into
fixing up.

Just a two cents thing :-)

> Esp.:
> 
> - the avr, lm32 and m32c target should be discontinued, because the 
> corresponding toolchains are in rather unusable shape with no 
> improvements in sight.
> 
> - the sh and h8x also seem to be candidates for discontinuation.
> At least I don't see a viable userbase of them.
> 
> >          Some GDB simulators do not support Mingw. We will likely have
> > to accept that.
> Correct.
> 
> 
> >      Status of USB and new TCP/IP stack
> >
> > -> We should not couple the RTEMS 4.11 release with the network stack
> > progress.
> My opinion: Not ready, postpone after 4.11.
> 
> Ralf
> 
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> 

-- 
Nick Withers

Embedded Systems Programmer
Room 2.26, Building 57
Department of Nuclear Physics
Research School of Physics and Engineering
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