[jbosstools-dev] PLEASE READ: Proposal for new approach to managing transient upstream deps like Tern, AngularJS and Thym

[Max Rydahl Andersen]

On 16 Nov 2014, at 17:11, Nick Boldt wrote:

> If you're a dev or QE for projects which use Tern, AngularJS, or Thym,
> or any other upstream incubating / frequently-changing dependency,
> please *read and reply* if this approach seems reasonable to you.
>
> ---
>
> For dependencies like Tern, AngularJS and Thym, instead of iteratively
> updating them every few weeks in the target platform, we could instead
> treat them like jbosstools-* components, and simply refer to them as
> <dependencies> within dependent projects' root poms.

Last week we said that was possible for thym. Not sure if a unified 
approch will work well for tern and especially angularjs.

> We used to do this for "moving target" upstream dependencies like 
> m2e-*
> extensions,

which ones ? the ones we have inside jbosstools github ? those are 
different beasts than tern, angularjs, thym because
these actually exist *outside* our releases.

> but for JBDS 8 we put EVERYTHING into the target platform
> and it was a bit of a pain to manage.
>
> We could go a step further, too, and do automated weekly pulls of new
> upstream deps.

For thym - maybe. Gorkem's call.

For angularjs/tern - if we don't follow the changes closely and have 
test for verifying we are still working
then I would be really hesitant toward this.

> ---
>
> The process would look like this:
>
> * every Friday, a Jenkins job pings eclipse.org looking for the latest
> available Tern, AngularJS, and Thym builds.
>
> * if a newer one is found, a mirror is pulled and added to the pile on
> http://download.jboss.org/jbosstools/updates/requirements/

how do we keep track on which can be cleaned up/removed and which need 
to stay ?

> * the latest one is then symlinked from
> http://download.jboss.org/jbosstools/updates/requirements/{tern,angularjs,thym}/latest

this won't work reliably when we multiple streams building. Which stream 
uses what then ? and how does it get locked down for release ?

> * new entries are added to the parent pom for these 3 URLs:
>
> https://github.com/jbosstools/jbosstools-build/blob/master/parent/pom.xml#L84

> * projects which wish to build against these newer deps can do so by
> choice (local experiments) or automatically by updating their root 
> poms
> to include new <repository> entries:
>
> https://github.com/jbosstools/jbosstools-jst/blob/master/pom.xml#L23-L27
>
> * projects will then need to monitor their manifests/feature.xml files
> to ensure they depend on the correct versions of upstream deps:
>
> https://github.com/jbosstools/jbosstools-jst/blob/master/plugins/org.jboss.tools.jst.jsdt/META-INF/MANIFEST.MF#L8-L22
>
> * should they forget, their build will break w/ an obvious error 
> message

this only applies to tern/angularjs because no stable api in the areas 
we rely.

> * they can then apply a fix & rebuild, or rollback to an earlier
> upstream dep in their root pom's <repository> reference, if they're 
> not
> able to move up to the newer Tern. Angular, or Thym dependency.

you want to allow each component to be able to say they use different 
version of tern, angularjs or thym ?

How do we ensure our builds will actually be compatible with each other 
?

Thats my biggest headache with these.

I dont think an alternate repository reference should be allowed into 
the stream's. They need to use the one defined by parent.

forks/feature branches can use it for testing new things, but when 
integrating it to master the versions need be aligned, wont you say ?

/max
http://about.me/maxandersen