MacOS X development and support

[Colin Hall]

Hi,

I'm interested to improve the pace and quality of development of
Lilypond for MacOS X. I'd like to know if the developers are
supportive of this, and get your advice on how to best direct my
efforts.

First, a few statements to solicit information. I'm keen, but
ignorant. I don't know which devs work on MacOS X development, for
instance. This isn't a witch hunt. Simple "Agree" "Disagree" would be
helpful:

Development of code specific to the MacOS X platforms, especially
Lilypad, is slow.

We don't have devs or bug squadders with access to Mac hardware to
verify new releases.

We need more developers working on MacOS X.

We don't need MacOS X developers. We just need someone to maintain the
MacOS X aspects of GUB and direct those devs who can help with
patches.

Let's drop Lilypad. It's getting in the way of regular releases.

Let's replace Lilypad with a simple app that is a drop target and log
window.




Some things I am doing or could do in the future:

Mac hardware to test new releases, specifically MacOS X PPC
10.4.x. This is now a work in progress. I have an iMac Flat-Panel
(10.4 PPC G4) and promise of a PPC G5 tower for testing new releases.

Establishing a circle of Lilypond MacOS users that I can coordinate to
verify specific aspects of new releases. I have started on this and
have the following users signed up:

  | MacOS X | x86/ppc | User               |
  | version |         |                    |
  |---------+---------+--------------------|
  |  10.4.x | ppc     | Ole Schmidt        |
  |         |         | Valentin Villenave |
  |         |         | James Worlton      |
  |         |         | Colin Hall         |
  |---------+---------+--------------------|
  |  10.4.x | x86     |                    |
  |---------+---------+--------------------|
  |  10.5.8 | ppc     | Stan Sanderson     |
  |---------+---------+--------------------|
  |  10.5.8 | x86     | Stan Sanderson     |
  |---------+---------+--------------------|
  |  10.6.x | x86     |                    |
  |---------+---------+--------------------|
  |  10.7.3 | x86     | Eric Schissel      |
  |         |         |                    |

Obviously, I'd like to fill the remaining gaps. Any devs out there able to help?



Resolving GUB build issues relating to Mac OS X targets. Not much
progress here. I have cloned the GUB git on my Linux x86_32 and x86_64
machines but I haven't got past make bootstrap. I wouldn't mind some
help with that.

Develop patches for Mac OS X targets. I have relevant skills and
experience. Not started on this yet. Is there anyone in the dev
community who could mentor me in this?



Finally, some specific questions:

Does GUB work?


Is GUB used to produce the Lilypond releases for all platforms, or is
it only used to create some of them?


Which develops have access to MacOS X hardware?



Is it possible to verify Mac OS X x86 using a VM?



Finally, I can see me having a couple of Macs here to test releases, a
working GUB install for resolving build issues, and a few keen Mac
users who verify fixes on Mac plaforms that I don't have to
hand. Getting to that point will be a chunk of work. I have an inkling
that others have tried to do this too, and given up. I don't want to
set out in that direction unless it is something that the dev
community support and that I have a reasonable chance of success.

Looking forward to your responses and a lively discussion.

Cheers,
Colin.

-- 

Colin Hall