[lsb-discuss] [Printing-architecture] Slides for GSoC report on the PWG Meetingin October

[Stew Benedict]

On Tue, 30 Sep 2008, Till Kamppeter wrote:

> Olaf Meeuwissen wrote:
> > Till Kamppeter <till.kamppeter at gmail.com> writes:
> > 
> >> Olaf Meeuwissen wrote:
> >>> [snip]
> >>> Then a question.  Is the SANE API really slated for inclusion in
> >>> LSB-4.0?  I've seen only very minimal discussion on the lsb-discuss
> >>> list.
> >> The problem is the missing manpower for writing specs and test suites.
> > 
> > Could you be more specific about:
> > 
> >  - what kind of specs are required
> >  - what kind of test suites are required
> >  - how much time is approximately needed for each of these
> >  - the process involved to contribute these
> >
> 
> Can someone of the LSB work group help Olaf here and post appropriate 
> documentation links, explain what to do, ...
> 
> 

I'll try to give some input.  There are a number of steps:

1) import of the sane interfaces into the database

I did a first pass try of this a while back, and things appeared to mostly 
come out right.

ref:

https://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/SANE40
http://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/LibToLSB (import part is obsolete)
http://ispras.linux-foundation.org/index.php/LSB_Library_Import_Tools

2) writing/integrating of specs

If upstream specs are adequate, then this piece can be a fairly small 
amount of work, basically a pointer to the upstream (preferable a static 
copy we can be assured will remain where it is and unchanged). Then of 
course the sane spec would need to be integrated into the spec as a whole.

Ref #2 above has some info on spec writing. I think Ron has created some 
better references.

3) writing/integrating tests

We have a number of test technologies we use.  I'm most familiar with 
either adapting upstream's unit tests into something we can use, or the 
classic tet-style tests like lsb-test-core or the cups portion of the 
printing tests use. There are also new test frameworks which our 
colleagues at ISP/RAS are most familiar with.

Ref #2 has some info on writing tests. The printing/cups tests are in bzr 
here:

http://bzr.linux-foundation.org/lsb/devel/printing-test?cmd=inventory;rev=mats%40freestandards.org-20080930053543-wj9dlz85w23vsv4b;path=sources/printing-test/

See convenience, ppd, raster

Writing the tests isn't usually a huge task, if we're still talking about 
14 interfaces. Testing them and bugfixing across a number of distributions 
can be time consuming.

> > That would make it easier for me to see 
if/when/where I can provide > > some sorely missing manpower ;-)
> > 
> >> As the printer manufacturers benefit most from these new requirements,
> >> I think the best is to ask them for help.
> >>
> >> Olaf, would you, or someone of your co-workers at Avasys help here?
> > 
> > I would like to help but it doesn't look like I'll be having any time
> > until around the end of October (and even after that I'm not so sure
> > I'll be having a lot of time).
> 
> LSB developers, what are the time frames for finishing specs and test 
> suites. Are they different for SANE, as SANE is planned to get into the 
> trial use category?
> 

I could be mistaken, but I think we pretty much took sane off the table 
when we hit the feature freeze point and we hadn't yet made much progress 
with it, but I by no means have the final say. Beta release of 4.0 is 
supposed to be happening this week.

Hope this helps,
-- 
Stew Benedict
The Linux Foundation