CPAM with TWW/Cross-Platform Application Management With CPAM HPMS

= Cross-Platform Application Management With CPAM HPMS =

Overview

 * Problems we are facing

Computers created by mankind are a reflection of human races. The Java environment is a good example aim to do same "things" across different incompatible paltforms. X Windows and GNUstep are another two examples aim to provide unified and consistent programming environment for application developers.
 * Possible Solutions

A solution to deal with application management across different OS is needed. Given GNUstep's cross-platform declaration on application development activities, so should the application management activities cross-platform unified. by unified, we don't mean to through away your existing investment on your application, we like to work with your existing system but to come up with a least denominator standard we can all agree upon. like ...TBA.

In this project we like to use GNUstep application as an example to demonstrate the benefits of using CPAM. There are currently different package sources to create GNUstep package for different OS platforms. We will demonstrate using one package source to create native package for different OS. and also using same tool to maintain GNUstep package.

This book will explain using HPMS to package GNUstep for deploying GNUstep on different OS platform easily. Also we explore the possibility of integrating HPMS funcation into GNUstep to add HPMS into GNUstep.

Project Overview slides
TBA.

Brief introduction of a few PMS and its package format

 * RPM
 * Solaris pkgadd
 * HP-UX SD-UX
 * GNUstep pkg
 * MacOS X pkg
 * Debian dpkg
 * ipkg for Embeded Linux system.
 * Comparison of PMS
 * Comparison of HPMS

Architecture of a HPMS
HPMS                     TWW

PMS     RPM      PKGADD         MSI         SD-UX - --- ---  --       | Linux | | Solaris |  | Windows |  | HP-UX  | OS    |       | |         |  |         |  |        | --  ---  --

Why doing it

 * Automation of package management to improve efficiency.
 * A software compiling process is very complex and needs to be exact on what other software you need to compile with and how you configure the compilation flags to the compiler. This complex process can actually be programmed into a script and be repeatable by easy commands without waiting for the original author to reproduce the process.
 * Lots of time is spent by experienced gurus to assist new developer/packager with compiling the source.
 * Time can be better spent on software developement instead of on the compiling and packaging process.
 * The software and package creation processes can be reproduced easily by others with simple commands.
 * Improves QA testing by generating bug fixes quickly.

When
TBA.

Technology Provider: TWW Inc. http://www.thewrittenword.com
This project is using CPAM tools created by TWW Inc.The company created TWW tool sets to help cross-platform open-source package creation and deployment. Currently GNUstep is not available in the list of their supported packages. The good thing is that we have a chance to invite steppers to create the package sources together. All sources of their supported packages are available at ftp://support.thewrittenword.com. Those package sources need to be compiled with the vendor's compiler. The gcc compiler is used only on RedHat platform.

Team member

 * T.J. Yang
 * Put your name and contact information here if you are serious about this project.

Plan

 * Introduce the CPAM(Cross-Platform Application Management) tool implemented by TWW Inc. to the GNUstep CPAD community
 * Cross-Platform is easier said than done because each platform's features are barriers for others.
 * Release GNUstep package source implemented by TWW CPAM.
 * I will release a working package source for others to try and review.
 * The package sources can generate native package format for RHAS rpm,Solaris pkgadd and HP-UX depot formats.
 * Write a tutorial on learning TWW CPAM.
 * I am willing to help/assist a few persons to get familiar with TWW tools if they promise to write up what they learned in a tutorial article.

Current TWW HPMS supported Systems
please see http://www.thewrittenword.com/evaluate/ for currently supported OS platforms.