Buildbots

[Simon Peyton Jones]

Friends

The nightly-build infrastructure for GHC is in disarray, and we could really do with help.  We really want
 * Continuous integration so that new test failures show up fast
 * Nightly builds on a variety of platforms, giving
   snapshots that are easy to install

Originally we used Buildbot (http://buildbot.net/). Then in 2010 Ian Lynagh put a lot of work into a build-bot infrastructure, implemented in Haskell as an open-source project, GHC Builder (​https://ghc.haskell.org/trac/ghc/wiki/Builder).  See https://ghc.haskell.org/trac/ghc/wiki/Status/Apr10#Nightlybuilds for the reasoning at the time.

As I understand it, Builder never "caught fire", and now that Ian has moved on I don't know that anyone is maintaining it; nor are the various builders working so far as I know.  Perhaps competing technology has moved on, so that the original rationale no longer holds?  I'm not sure.

Regardless, we lack leadership in this area.  Joachim Breitner has set up Travis-CI.  (I don't know exactly what that is, but it sounds useful.)  Others have indicated interest/willingness.  But it would be fantastic to have a person, or (more plausibly) a small group who assumed leadership.

An early question would be: to continue to use a DIY system (Builder), or to move to some other better-supported (but perhaps less malleable) system.  I don't even know what the options are.

Others will be better informed than me about all this... we'd love to hear from you.

Thank you!

Simon

| -----Original Message-----
| From: Glasgow-haskell-users [mailto:glasgow-haskell-users-
| bounces at haskell.org] On Behalf Of harry
| Sent: 01 April 2014 08:42
| To: glasgow-haskell-users at haskell.org
| Subject: Buildbots
| 
| It having been suggested that a buildbot for Windows may be needed, and
| it
| being possible that I may receive permission from management for setting
| one
| up in my department's server room, I set about attempting to discover
| what
| this actually entails.
| 
| A Google search led me to https://ghc.haskell.org/trac/ghc/wiki/BuildBot,
| which tells me that "Buildbot is currently down, and we are working on a
| replacement. See Builder for more details." If I follow the 'down' link ,
| I
| get to the GHC status April 2010 page, which says that buildbot has been
| abandoned, suggesting that the page should be deleted. Could someone
| confirm
| before I go ahead and delete it?
| 
| The Builder page has clear instructions on how to set up a build slave,
| and
| a link to the build results. The build results contains an assortment of
| dud
| links and builds from August and earlier.
| 
| What is the current state of automated builds?
| 
| 
| 
| --
| View this message in context:
| http://haskell.1045720.n5.nabble.com/Buildbots-tp5746770.html
| Sent from the Haskell - Glasgow-haskell-users mailing list archive at
| Nabble.com.
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