[150] in Release_7.7_team
Meeting Minutes 8/10/94
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Dorothy Bowe)
Mon Aug 15 16:45:27 1994
To: release-77@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 15 Aug 1994 16:45:04 EDT
From: Dorothy Bowe <dot@MIT.EDU>
In attendance: Dot, JJ, John, Kevin, Craig, Matt, Carla, Bruce
Agenda
1. How goes the release
2. August patch release
3. What's next ?
(The meeting was a bit random, and therefore my notes will be too. At
least, that's my excuse. As usual, any errors are probably mine. -Dot)
1. Release status
One of the major inconveniences caused by this release is the upgrade of
LaTeX/TeX. We decided that August is probably not a good time to make
such a switch because of the number of theses due at this time. Now
that we know about this, we won't do it again. We also decided to put
something into the global motd in the effort to get more people to
read the stock answers.
[Aside note: the major problem was that people panic'd and didn't read
the information available to them.]
We also discussed the problem with the login window fonts on the
RS/6000s in building 37. The patch is ready; John will see that the
machines in 37 are rebooted.
There was some discussion about the problems caused by upgrading to
solaris 2.3. The only people affected this time (that we know of)
were private workstations which did not update at the same time they
got the new system packs. (See Long Term Issues)
2. August Patch Release
We decided on the following schedule for a patch release:
Test packs available August 22
Field release August 30
Because the release is out to the field, it will be complicated to
have test packs available to people in the "staff test" cluster, so
the main group of testers will be those in "beta test". With the
exception of mh, the changes made for this patch will be very minor.
(See below)
Why are we doing a patch release? There are fixes available (and
tested) for several problems which did not make it into the first
round, or which have been reported since the packs went to the field.
Items to be included in a patch release:
DECstation
MH fix (Fix for new signature feature)
login NGROUPS (Same fix already applied to xlogin)
missing X applications (Just a couple minor ones which were
moved to contrib in the X distribution)
xdvi (?) (Fix for ligature display problem)
Sun
solaris_reconf fix
find (latest version from Sun)
explicit attach dumps core fix
MH fix
xdvi (?)
permissions on /dev/audio
/dev/rdiskette always busy
xzwrite dumps core on close *
RS/6000
MH fix
xdvi (?)
Dash fix*
* Added since the release meeting. The fix for Dash is already out in
the form of /srvd/patch; it will be incorporated in the release when
the upgrade goes out.
For more information on anything to be included in this patch release,
see me.
The bug with ezviewer displaying 7's instead of bullets will *not* be
fixed. Bill says it is a troff problem.
When the release is available, the release team will coordinate to
make sure MH is tested as much as possible on all three platforms.
3. What happens next?
We're not exactly sure what is going to happen next. There will be no
formal meeting regarding the August patch release as many people will
be busy with fall startup activities. Dot is meeting with the PPT on
August 17th, in part to figure out what happens to the release team
and the release now. More information will be forthcoming as it is
available. (Communication will take place via email until such time
as we need to meet.)
Long Term Issues to Consider "Next Time"
* Staff should have RS/6000s on their desks, assuming that we want to
continue to support them.
* August is a bad time for releases because of theses
* Solaris operating system upgrades need careful attention to how they
happen. You can't get the new system packs without upgrading, at
least not without causing major problems. (I'm still a little hazy
on the details of why...)
* Can we pay students to test the release?
