May 01, 2017
On 16 April 2017 at 11:54, Iain Buclaw <ibuclaw@gdcproject.org> wrote:
> On 16 April 2017 at 11:20, Johannes Pfau via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:
>> Am Sun, 16 Apr 2017 10:13:50 +0200
>> schrieb Iain Buclaw via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>:
>>
>>>
>>> I asked at a recent D meetup about what gitlab CI used as their backing platform, and it seems like it's a front for TravisCI.  YMMV, but I found the Travis platform to be too slow (it was struggling to even build GDC in under 40 minutes), and too limiting to be used as a CI for large projects.
>>
>> That's probably for the hosted gitlab solution though. For self-hosted gitlab you can set up custom machines as gitlab workers. The biggest drawback here is missing gitlab integration.
>>
>>>
>>> Johannes, what if I get a couple new small boxes, one ARM, one non-descriptive x86.  The project site and binary downloads could then be used to the non-descriptive box, meanwhile the ARM box and the existing server can be turned into a build servers - there's enough disk space and memory on the current server to have a at least half a dozen build environments on the current server, testing also i386 and x32 would be beneficial along with any number cross-compilers (testsuite can be ran with runnable tests disabled).
>>
>> Sounds like a plan. What CI server should we use though?
>>
>
> I was thinking of keeping it simple, buildbot maybe?
>
> http://buildbot.net/


I provisionally got an account with these guys last month, and now I've just seen this:

https://blog.online.net/2017/04/27/scaleway-disruptive-armv8-cloud-servers/

So that's 3 build servers - 1x ARM7, 1x ARM8, and 1x x86. ;-)
May 01, 2017
On 1 May 2017 at 14:40, Iain Buclaw <ibuclaw@gdcproject.org> wrote:
> So that's 3 build servers - 1x ARM7, 1x ARM8, and 1x x86. ;-)

With the latter also testing all crosses we can do (there are 18 different gdc cross-compilers in Ubuntu, for 12 distinct architectures).
May 01, 2017
Am Mon, 1 May 2017 14:44:35 +0200
schrieb Iain Buclaw via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>:

> On 1 May 2017 at 14:40, Iain Buclaw <ibuclaw@gdcproject.org> wrote:
> > So that's 3 build servers - 1x ARM7, 1x ARM8, and 1x x86. ;-)
> 
> With the latter also testing all crosses we can do (there are 18 different gdc cross-compilers in Ubuntu, for 12 distinct architectures).

BTW is there some documentation on how to update / rebuild these debian / ubuntu packages with updated GDC sources?

-- Johannes

May 01, 2017
On 1 May 2017 at 17:47, Johannes Pfau via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:
> Am Mon, 1 May 2017 14:44:35 +0200
> schrieb Iain Buclaw via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>:
>
>> On 1 May 2017 at 14:40, Iain Buclaw <ibuclaw@gdcproject.org> wrote:
>> > So that's 3 build servers - 1x ARM7, 1x ARM8, and 1x x86. ;-)
>>
>> With the latter also testing all crosses we can do (there are 18 different gdc cross-compilers in Ubuntu, for 12 distinct architectures).
>
> BTW is there some documentation on how to update / rebuild these debian / ubuntu packages with updated GDC sources?
>
> -- Johannes
>

Doubt it, the debian source packages are quite complex too - though there's only a few places that need changing, once you work out exactly *where*.

As you're just updating GDC sources, it should just be a case of replacing the gdc tarball with a new copy, and the rest is already handled.
May 01, 2017
On 1 May 2017 at 18:18, Iain Buclaw <ibuclaw@gdcproject.org> wrote:
> On 1 May 2017 at 17:47, Johannes Pfau via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:
>> Am Mon, 1 May 2017 14:44:35 +0200
>> schrieb Iain Buclaw via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>:
>>
>>> On 1 May 2017 at 14:40, Iain Buclaw <ibuclaw@gdcproject.org> wrote:
>>> > So that's 3 build servers - 1x ARM7, 1x ARM8, and 1x x86. ;-)
>>>
>>> With the latter also testing all crosses we can do (there are 18 different gdc cross-compilers in Ubuntu, for 12 distinct architectures).
>>
>> BTW is there some documentation on how to update / rebuild these debian / ubuntu packages with updated GDC sources?
>>
>> -- Johannes
>>
>
> Doubt it, the debian source packages are quite complex too - though there's only a few places that need changing, once you work out exactly *where*.
>
> As you're just updating GDC sources, it should just be a case of replacing the gdc tarball with a new copy, and the rest is already handled.

Though for the purpose of CI, we could either build the toolchain ourselves - either using https://crosstool-ng.github.io, or re-use the existing cross toolchains in Ubuntu - in both cases, cache the finished set-up in a docker image.  Building GDC would be still done by hand just to keep things simple, which should only be a case of configuring the correct host and target triplet (or maybe http://build-gdc.readthedocs.io :-)
May 08, 2017
> Let's not forget Kotlin and Swift, things we'd really be competing against - that is the other NEW stuff.

Kotlin/Native is now in the making and there is already a preview:

https://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin/2017/04/kotlinnative-tech-preview-kotlin-without-a-vm/
May 09, 2017
On 5/8/17 9:26 PM, Bienlein wrote:
>> Let's not forget Kotlin and Swift, things we'd really be competing
>> against - that is the other NEW stuff.
>
> Kotlin/Native is now in the making and there is already a preview:
>
> https://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin/2017/04/kotlinnative-tech-preview-kotlin-without-a-vm/
>

All in all Kotlin is a decent language, also since JetBrains has Russian roots I kind of sympathize its development :)

---
Dmitry Olshansky
May 09, 2017
On Thursday, 6 April 2017 at 05:24:07 UTC, Joakim wrote:
> That means this tidal wave of mobile swamping PCs is only going to get worse:
>
> https://twitter.com/lukew/status/842397687420923904
>
> D is currently built and optimized for that dying PC platform.  There are only two devs working on mobile, Dan and me, I don't think anybody on the core team has even tried our work.

"dying". Just cause there aren't a lot of new devices being sold doesn't mean it is dying. There's the used market to consider, and PCs have a long lifespan. I have a 7 year old desktop that still runs perfectly fine and does all the tasks and computing I need to be done. I'll probably be using it for another few years, maybe when zen+ comes out or there's actually a reason to buy a new computer. Even then I won't be buying a prebuilt, not sure if those sales figures includes sales of PC parts. Even though new PC sales are declining, GPU sales are seeing a major increase in sales.

May 09, 2017
On Tuesday, 9 May 2017 at 04:39:33 UTC, Jerry wrote:
> On Thursday, 6 April 2017 at 05:24:07 UTC, Joakim wrote:
>> That means this tidal wave of mobile swamping PCs is only going to get worse:
>>
>> https://twitter.com/lukew/status/842397687420923904
>>
>> D is currently built and optimized for that dying PC platform.
>>  There are only two devs working on mobile, Dan and me, I don't think anybody on the core team has even tried our work.
>
> "dying". Just cause there aren't a lot of new devices being sold doesn't mean it is dying. There's the used market to consider, and PCs have a long lifespan. I have a 7 year old desktop that still runs perfectly fine and does all the tasks and computing I need to be done. I'll probably be using it for another few years, maybe when zen+ comes out or there's actually a reason to buy a new computer. Even then I won't be buying a prebuilt, not sure if those sales figures includes sales of PC parts. Even though new PC sales are declining, GPU sales are seeing a major increase in sales.

On the other hand, even if sales are doubling, that doesn't mean you aren't dying.  Consider Blackberry, whose sales rocketed up even after the iPhone was first introduced in 2007:

https://www.recode.net/2017/2/26/14742598/blackberry-sales-market-share-chart

Then, all of a sudden, people realized, "Why are we buying these old-fashioned keyboard smartphones?"  From 2006-2010 Blackberry sales went up 5X, doing really well but still lagging far behind the explosive growth of Android/iPhone, and now it is basically dead.  The mobile wave killed Blackberry, the previous smartphone leader in the US and many other countries.  Nokia was tops worldwide, also now dead.

That is similar to what is happening to PCs: a slow decline followed by a precipitious collapse, when people realize, "Why are we still buying these old-fashioned PCs when we can do _everything_ on our mobile devices now?"  When multi-window is practically ubiquituous on mobile, which it will be soon since it is baked into Android Nougat, that is what will happen.
May 09, 2017
On Tue, May 09, 2017 at 09:08:17AM +0000, Joakim via Digitalmars-d wrote: [...]
> On the other hand, even if sales are doubling, that doesn't mean you aren't dying.  Consider Blackberry, whose sales rocketed up even after the iPhone was first introduced in 2007:
> 
> https://www.recode.net/2017/2/26/14742598/blackberry-sales-market-share-chart
> 
> Then, all of a sudden, people realized, "Why are we buying these old-fashioned keyboard smartphones?"

FWIW, my wife hated the touchphones and clung on to her Blackberry keyboard for as long as she could. Now she has an iphone (grudgingly) and slowly getting the hang of it, but still complains that touch typing is annoying.

History is a cruel master.


T

-- 
Which is worse: ignorance or apathy? Who knows? Who cares? -- Erich Schubert