Re: Performance issues on Windows, suggests a MSVC build

[John W. Eaton]

On 25-Jun-2011, Philip Nienhuis wrote:

|    You mean the Python developers themselves?
|    I wouldn't know how they do it. Browsing www.python.org I couldn't 
| find much info on that. Looking at their buildbot page:
| 
(http://www.python.org/dev/buildbot/all/waterfall?category=3.x.stable&category=3.x.unstable)
| I see lots of platforms mentioned.
|    Apparently Python has a broader, more coherent and more powerful 
| development community than Octave (lucky for them, sad for Octave).

So how do we change that situation for the Octave project?  My guess
is not by asking that the current developers do even more than they
already do, but by getting more people involved.

|    For R a formalized Windows build tool set based on MingW seems to be 
| available and maintained:
| http://www.murdoch-sutherland.com/Rtools/

I know some of the R developers and I think this is maybe the result
of just one or a few dedicated people.  Again, lucky for them, I
guess.

|    Maybe that can be amended for Octave. Building (most? of) the various 
| Octave dependencies would still be needed.
|    But indeed, a similar build development is what IMO is needed to 
| facilitate building & developing Octave on Windows (Note: without me 
| pointing at someone to make it).

And of course we are back at the same point of "it would be great to
have this happen, but I can't do it and I can't pay for it".  I'm not
trying to single you out here.  I certainly understand that there are
things people want but don't have the expertise or time to do.

But if anything is to come from this discussion, what should it be?

It would be great if we could find some people who would be willing to
take on the role of building Octave binaries for Windows.  If those
people work closely enough with us, then we could distribute the
results directly from ftp.gnu.org, "blessed" by the Octave project
itself and offer a "one-click" install from the web page, making
nearly all Windows users happy as I think this is what most of them
expect -- how many times have we seen Windows users say "where is the
'download now' button", or "I downloaded the tar.gz file, now what?"

Expecting the current developers who don't use, know, or care about
Windows to build a binary installer so that someone else can take it
over and maintain it is not the solution.  Building the binary and
creating the installer is precisely the job we need the Windows
developers to do and we already have that anyway, in the form of the
3.2.4 release and the files in the Octave Forge SVN archive.  So as I
see it, we already have a decent starting point.  We just need someone
or some group to step up and take on the project.

If we can't find people to do this job, then I think we need to post a
clear statement on the web site explaining the situation so that when
we get future requests, we can just point people to the explanation.
I'm thinking of something like:

  The Octave project depends on volunteers to build executable
  versions of Octave.  Currently there are no volunteers actively
  working on preparing an installer for Octave on Windows systems.
  Because of this, we have no idea when an installer for Windows will
  be available.  Asking us when something will be ready won't make it
  happen any faster.  What will help is finding someone to do the job,
  or finding sufficient funding to pay someone to do the job.  If you
  would like to help with the project, please contact the
  address@hidden mailing list.

Note that we currently have the same situation for Debian (and
therefore Ubuntu), eh?

jwe