Re: [Autotest] [RFC] KVM test: Ship rss.exe and finish.exe binaries with KVM test

From: Yolkfull Chow <yzhou@redhat.com>
To: Lucas Meneghel Rodrigues <lmr@redhat.com>
Cc: Autotest mailing list <autotest@test.kernel.org>,
	Marcelo Tosatti <mtosatti@redhat.com>,
	KVM mailing list <kvm@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [Autotest] [RFC] KVM test: Ship rss.exe and finish.exe binaries with KVM test
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2010 15:53:54 +0800	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <20100203075354.GA2269@aFu.nay.redhat.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <1265111314.7539.115.camel@localhost.localdomain>

>On Tue, Feb 02, 2010 at 09:48:34AM -0200, Lucas Meneghel Rodrigues wrote:
> Hi folks:
> 
> We're on an effort of streamlining the KVM test experience, by choosing
> sane defaults and helper scripts that can overcome the initial barrier
> with getting the KVM test running. On one of the conversations I've had
> today, we came up with the idea of shipping the compiled windows
> programs rss.exe and finish.exe, needed for windows hosts testing.
> 
> Even though rss.exe and finish.exe can be compiled in a fairly
> straightforward way using the awesome cross compiling environment with
> mingw, there are some obvious limitations to it:
> 
> 1) The cross compiling environment is only available for fedora >= 11.
> No other distros I know have it.
> 
> 2) Sometimes it might take time for the user to realize he/she has to
> compile the source code under unattended/ folder, and how to do it.
> 
> That person would take a couple of failed attempts scratching his/her
> head thinking "what the heck is this deps/finish.exe they're talking
> about?". Surely documentation can help, and I am looking at making the
> documentation on how to do it more easily discoverable.
> 
> That said, shipping the binaries would make the life of those people
> easier, and anyway the binaries work pretty well across all versions of
> windows from winxp to win7, they are self contained, with no external
> dependencies (they all use the standard win32 API).
> 
> 3) That said we also need a script that can build the entire
> winutils.iso without making the user to spend way too much time figuring
> out how to do it. I want to work on such a script on the next days.
> 
> So, what are your opinions? Should we ship the binaries or pursue a
> script that can build those for the user as soon as the (yet to be
> integrated) get_started.py script runs? Remember that the later might
> mean users of RHEL <= 5.X and debian like will be left out in the cold.
> 
> Looking forward hearing your input,
> 
> Lucas

Hi Lucas,

I believe it's straightforward way for newbie of kvm-autotest to get quickly started.

I once compiled the source code two times, and each time I have to find the email
that has the exact command with options. 

Thanks for working on this. :-)

> 
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