How to prepare an Aladdin Ghostscript release |
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For other information, see the Ghostscript overview and the instructions on how to build Ghostscript.
This document describes the process that Aladdin Enterprises uses to make new Ghostscript releases. As time goes on, it will become a more suitable document for others wishing to prepare releases for distribution. Please note that although the Aladdin Free Public License allows anyone to prepare and distribute releases in accordance with its terms and conditions, this document is really meant only for developers working closely with Aladdin.
File names below that don't include an explicit subdirectory name are in the src subdirectory.
If you do plan to make your own distribution, please be aware of some items you will want to change.
The Aladdin Ghostscript files are maintained on sites accessible to the public. One specific site hosts the active CVS repository for code, data, and documentation, and the bug report data base; several sites offer distributions with version numbers, intended for wider distribution.
The primary repository for Aladdin Ghostscript is SourceForge (http://sourceforge.net). Please read the SourceForge Aladdin Ghostscript home page (http://ghostscript.sourceforge.net) first. CVS access information is available at http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=1897.
Both tested and tester releases are available from
http://sourceforge.net/project/filelist.php?group_id=1897
Tested public releases are also distributed from
ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/aladdin/
Tester releases are also distributed from
ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/aladdin/test/
When adding or removing files, don't forget to invoke cvs add or cvs rm.
When adding or removing files other than .c or .h: If the files are included in the fileset (i.e., not just support files), check the install list in unixinst.mak.
When adding .c files, update the relevant .mak file (usually devs.mak, int.mak, or lib.mak).
When adding operators, or adding or changing filters, update doc/Language.htm if desired.
When adding .h files, add a _h definition in the appropriate .mak file.
When adding or changing fonts, update Fontmap.GS, fonts.mak, and possibly the compiled fonts in gs.mak and the examples in doc/Fonts.htm.
When adding .ps files, update doc/Psfiles.htm.
This document only discusses source distributions. Source distributions currently can only be made on Linux systems (but it probably wouldn't take much work to support other Unix systems). Ghostscript as distributed also often includes executables or other packages for the Windows and MacOS environment, but Aladdin does not produce these, and this document does not discuss them. For more information about Windows packages, please contact bug-gswin@aladdin.com; for more information about MacOS packages; please contact mac-gs@aladdin.com.
To make a source distribution, you will need the scripts and data files in the toolbin/ directory. You will probably find it convenient to include this directory in the PATH, but the instructions below don't assume that you have done this. To run the scripts, you will need reasonably current versions of Tcl, freely available from Scriptics (http://www.scriptics.com), and Python, freely available from http://www.python.org.
The instructions below also refer to some files that are deliberately omitted from the public distribution, because they are copyrighted by their authors and not freely redistributable. You will need to provide similar files for your environment.
data/*/*.ps (PostScript files) - needed for smoke testing beta.msg - the announcement message for the release
Make sure the release date and version number are up to date in version.mak, lib/gs_init.ps, and doc/News.htm.
Update the number of the highest closed bug, and the list of open bugs, in doc/News.htm.
Check in gscdef.c that the definition of GS_PRODUCT includes the appropriate one of "TESTER RELEASE", "BETA RELEASE", or neither.
Check for patched configuration parameters, #define TESTs, version/date inconsistencies, and mismatches between the working directory and the CVS repository by running:
toolbin/pre
This program compares the result of various greps against a check file, writing the results of grep on one output file and the differences from the check file on another. See the source code of toolbin/pre for the default file names. The important one is the check file, toolbin/pre.chk. pre also verifies that the right information is in the following places:
If necessary, run
toolbin/pre update
to update the version and revision date in the doc files, and then run
toolbin/pre
again.
Check the consistency of the source code with the makefiles by running:
toolbin/gsmake check
Edit the makefile (presumably unix-gcc.mak) to set
FEATURE_DEVS=$(FEATURE_DEVS_ALL) COMPILE_INITS=1
This will help catch compilation problems.
Run
rm obj/* make -j2 >& t.log
and look for warnings and errors in the log file.
Do a smoke test in a separate window, replacing /gs with the name of the development root directory if necessary:
unset GS_DEVICE GS_FONTPATH GS_LIB GS_OPTIONS cd /tmp /gs/bin/gs -I/gs/lib -I/gs/fonts -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH /gs/toolbin/smoke.ps | tee t export TEMP=/gs/tmp /gs/bin/gs -I/gs/lib -I/gs/fonts -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=bitcmyk\ -sOutputFile=/dev/null -r600 -dMaxBitmap=1000000 /gs/toolbin/smoke.ps | tee t
This reads files named
/gs/data/ps/*.ps /gs/data/psl2/*.ps /gs/data/psl3/*.ps /gs/data/test/*.ps
(Edit toolbin/smoke.ps ad lib to use other test sets.) Watch for crashes, unusual error messages, or anomalous displayed output. If there are any problems, start over from the beginning of the process.
Undo the FEATURE_DEVS and COMPILE_INITS edits.
Run
cvs commit
to ensure the repository is up to date.
Execute
toolbin/cvs2hist -v #.#[#] > doc/Changes.htm
This consolidates all the CVS logs since the previous release in a readable format.
Run
toolbin/makehist
This updates doc/History#.htm from doc/News.htm and doc/Changes.htm. Then run
cvs commit
again to check in the Changes and history files.
Make the source archives with
toolbin/maketars
This creates the files
ghostscript-#.##.tar.gz (main archive) ghostscript-#.##.tar.bz2 (main archive) ghostscript-#.##gnu.tar.gz (GPL'ed files)
For Windows testing, you will need, in addition to the files listed under "Source distributions" above:
toolbin/makewin (link to makeset.tcl)
The following procedures are very Aladdin-specific; they rely on a large number of MS-DOS batch scripts that are not discussed here.
Mount the Windows partition on /c, and create the /c/work directory if needed.
Make the zip archive of all files needed for a Windows build, and copy it to the Windows partition:
toolbin/makewin cp gs###.zip /c/work
Boot into Windows. Unpack the archive:
cd \work unzip -oq gs###.zip gs###
The gs###.bat script creates some necessary directories, sets up PATH and GS_LIB for testing, and makes the gs#.#[#] directory current.
Build with the Borland compiler:
config bcwin32 copy /y /b ..\gs\makefile erase obj\*.* make > bc.log
Smoke test the executables (both gswin32 and gswin32c), as described above for source distributions. Then build with the Microsoft compiler:
config msvc32 copy /y /b ..\gs\makefile erase obj\*.* nmake > msvc.log
Smoke test these executables too.
Building with the Watcom compiler doesn't work, because the wmake or wmakel program runs out of memory. However, if it did work, this is how to do it:
config watcw32 copy /y /b ..\gs\makefile erase obj\*.* wmake -u > watc.log
Boot back into Linux. If testing in Windows revealed problems, edit the source files as necessary, and go back to "Preparing the source code."
If you are maintaining local master copies, execute
toolbin/makemaster
This creates a master/### directory if necessary, and moves the archives to it.
Tag the source files with the release number by executing
Upload and post ghostscript-#.##.tar.* to SourceForge using the "File Release" facility in the Aladdin Ghostscript project. If this is a test release, put it in the gs-test module, otherwise put it in the ghostscript module. If you are adding Windows executables to an existing source release, please use the same release date as the source release, not the current date.cvs tag gs#_#[#]
If ansi2knr.c has changed, put it on ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/ansi2knr.c.
If doc/C-style.htm has changed, put it on ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/aladdin/C-style.htm.
Do the steps for distributions in general.
Upload ghostscript-#.##.tar.* to ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/aladdin/test.
Construct the e-mail announcement by editing beta.msg; include the News section for this release. Mail using:
To: gs-test
Update the title (current version #), first heading (previous version #), and "new features" and "known problems" lists in doc/Current.htm.
Do the steps for distributions in general.
E-mail the release announcement using:
To: gs-announce
Edit the Web pages on the Wisconsin server to reflect the new release.
Edit doc/News.htm to remove all the content.
Copyright © 1999, 2000 Aladdin Enterprises. All rights reserved.
This file is part of Aladdin Ghostscript. See the Aladdin Free Public License (the "License") for full details of the terms of using, copying, modifying, and redistributing Aladdin Ghostscript.
Ghostscript version 6.21, 17 April 2000