[sldev] Documenting when to use SNOW vs when to use VWR

[Rob Lanphier]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for providing a bunch of cases to look at. First, some general
guidance, then some specifics:

Vocabulary:
"Shared bug" - exists in both Snowglobe and main Second Life viewer.
"Snowglobe-specific bug" - bug that we know is specific to Snowglobe
"Unvetted bug" - bug that has been found in one of the viewers, but has
not been tested in the other

Guidelines:
1. When there's a bug with no patch associated with it, it should only
live in one place (VWR or SNOW).
2. Shared bugs with no patch should live in VWR
3. Unvetted bugs can be filed in either SNOW or VWR, based on where they
are first found.
4. Unvetted SNOW bugs that are found to be shared should be moved to VWR.
5. Patched, shared bugs should live in VWR, with an optional pointer
from SNOW->VWR for tracking state independently
6. When a bug is duplicated between SNOW and VWR, the VWR issue should
be where the bulk of the conversation/tracking occurs, with only
Snowglobe-specific discussion occuring in the SNOW counterpart

With that, let's look through the list.

On 07/06/2009 02:42 PM, Mike Monkowski wrote:
> I read the transcript, but I still don't think I understand. Let me
> throw a few "for instance"s at you to see if I have this right.
>
> 1. Someone running SnowGlobe reports a bug as a SNOW issue. It is
> later determined that it is also a problem in the standard viewer. So
> a VWR issue is cloned and the SNOW issue is marked as a duplicate?

The issue should be moved over to VWR, (see #4)

> 2. Someone makes a fix to a SnowGlobe-only bug. It's posted as a patch
> on a SNOW issue. Correct?
Yup.

>
> 3. Someone makes a fix to a bug that affects both and has been
> reported as a VWR issue. The patch gets attached to the VWR issue.
> Then it is decided to put it in SnowGlobe but not the standard viewer
> (yet). A SNOW issue is cloned from the VWR issue? Or if a SNOW issue
> already exists (case 1 above) then reopen the SNOW issue?

Either is fine, so long as we get a SNOW issue and a VWR issue. The
point is to make sure that we have a place to track that an issue has
been fixed in Snowglobe.

> 4. Someone makes a fix to a bug that affects both and has been
> reported as a VWR issue and it is decided to put it in both. Is a SNOW
> issue still cloned or do we just wait for the branches to sync up to
> catch the fix for SnowGlobe?

Depends on how the fix is made:

1. If someone is going to manually apply the fix to Snowglobe directly,
there should be an issue in the SNOW project
2. If the plan is truly to wait for a merge of a Linden-published branch
before picking up the fix.

> 5. Someone creates a feature that he wishes would ultimately go into
> the main viewer. That's a VWR feature. Then it's decided to pick it up
> in SnowGlobe. The feature is cloned to SNOW?

Yup.

> So, in summary, a SNOW issue should only be created if the bug only
> affects SnowGlobe or cloned when cherry-picking VWR bug fixes and
> features?

> And Linden does the cherry-picking, hence the cloning?
Nope. There's some JIRA-fu that I need to engage in to make this
available to more people.

> Which means, as far as the developer-in-the-street is concerned, only
> create a SNOW issue if the bug only affects SnowGlobe?

Yup.
> But if he makes a mistake and it really does affect the standard
> viewer, then who does the cloning?
>
> Yes? No? Maybe so?

Don't worry too much about affecting VWR. Some folks might get annoyed
by the mistake, but they'll survive.

By the way, none of this is set in stone. I'd rather not spend a ton of
time debating this, but I'll concede that we may need to tweak the
process and improvise as we figure out how to use it.

Let's take further discussion here:
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/WEB-1118

Rob

> Rob Lanphier wrote:
>> Hi folks,
>>
>> A couple of weeks ago, we discussed how and when to file issues in the
>> SNOW project vs filing them in VWR:
>> https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Open_Source_Meeting/2009-06-25
>>
>> Is there a volunteer who can write up some guidelines, and post them to
>> the wiki, preferably either on the "Snowglobe QA" page, or a page that
>> we link to from there?
>> https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Snowglobe_QA
>>
>> One issue we didn't discuss was the subject of how to put issues in
>> doc/contributions.txt. In cases where there's both a SNOW issue and a
>> VWR issue, I'd strongly prefer that the VWR version goes into
>> doc/contributions.txt. Based on what I'm seeing so far, it'll make it
>> easier to keep track of what eventually lands in the mainline viewer
>> that gets its start in Snowglobe.
>>
>> Rob
>>
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