[scala-fresh] Announcing Fresh Scala

[David Pollak]

Folks,

I'm pleased to announce the Fresh Scala initiative.

One of the challenges with Scala development is the version fragility.  As traits change, the classes that depend on those traits "break" unless they are recompiled.  This means that as Scala grows and evolves, all the libraries that sit on top of Scala must be recompiled against the latest version of Scala.  This has presented a significant challenge as Scala 2.8 has evolved.  Each of the layers necessary to compile libraries (e.g., Scala -> ScalaCheck -> ScalaTest -> Specs -> Lift) must be compiled against the same version of Scala.  Because of this issue, it's been challenging to keep the growing number of Scala libraries up to date with Scala 2.8.

Fresh Scala aims to address this issue.  Fresh Scala is a community initiative that provides nightly builds of a collection of popular Scala libraries against a stable development branch of Scala.  Here's how it works:

• Paul Phillips is maintaining the "Fresh Scala" branch of Scala in his GitHub repository: http://github.com/paulp/scala/tree/fresh_scala Paul will merge stable trunk changes into the Fresh Scala branch
• The Scala Tools build system will pull changes from this repository and build "Fresh" versions of Scala as Paul applies patches to this branch.
• The following libraries will be built against the Fresh version of Scala: Akka, Lift, ScalaCheck, Scala Modules, ScalaTest, ScalaZ, Simple Build Tool, and Specs
• If any of the dependent libraries fail to compile and/or pass tests, the library maintainers will make reasonable efforts to fix their code within 24 hours.
• Every Sunday night (Pacific Time), a Fresh Milestone will be released of Scala and the above packages.
• The snapshot and milestone releases will be available via Maven, Ivy, SBT, etc. in the scala-tools.org maven repository.

The benefits of Fresh Scala to the community are:

• Continuous testing of Scala against popular libraries
• Fresh milestones on a weekly basis so that leading edge apps can be kept close to Scala 2.8 (and other pre-release versions) and there can be more extensive testing of frameworks, libraries and apps.
• Better feedback to EPFL about the status of Scala.

Over the next few weeks, we will get the Fresh Scala infrastructure built out and cranking out builds.  I'll put out an announcement and everyone can start using the latest builds.

I'd like to thank Paul for coming to my neck of the woods, putting the pattern matcher in jeopardy, to work on the core of Fresh Scala.  Thanks to Josh, Derek and the folks who are working on the Fresh Scala infrastructure.  Thanks to the library teams, especially the ScalaZ team, for joining in this effort.  And thanks to EPFL for creating Scala and working with the community as a whole to improve Scala and make it business-ready.

To keep up with the nuts and bolts of Fresh Scala, see this Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/scala-fresh

Thanks,

David

--
Lift, the simply functional web framework http://liftweb.net
Beginning Scala http://www.apress.com/book/view/1430219890
Follow me: http://twitter.com/dpp
Surf the harmonics

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Scala Fresh" group.
To post to this group, send email to scala...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to scala-fresh...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/scala-fresh?hl=en.

[ijuma]

Hey all,

As I said in one of the other mailing lists that this was sent to,
this is great news.

On May 19, 5:20 am, David Pollak <feeder.of.the.be...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Fresh Scala aims to address this issue.  Fresh Scala is a community
> initiative that provides nightly builds of a collection of popular Scala
> libraries against a stable development branch of Scala.

Is there a set of criteria for libraries to join this effort? I was
thinking specifically about scalala as it stresses the specialization
feature of the compiler. I asked in that group[1] and there is
interest even if scalala is perhaps less mature than some of the other
libraries in Scala Fresh.

Best,
Ismael

[1] http://groups.google.com/group/scalala/browse_thread/thread/c369568259f25388

[Jason Zaugg]

I recently set up a SBT build for Scalala, and will be happy to
maintain a slot for it in Fresh.

-jason

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 12:03 PM, ijuma <ism...@juma.me.uk> wrote:
> Hey all,
>
> As I said in one of the other mailing lists that this was sent to,
> this is great news.
>

> Is there a set of criteria for libraries to join this effort? I was
> thinking specifically about scalala as it stresses the specialization
> feature of the compiler. I asked in that group[1] and there is
> interest even if scalala is perhaps less mature than some of the other
> libraries in Scala Fresh.

[Josh Suereth]

I think maintainers should be the primary requirement (besides the time it takes to set things up on the website end.)

What does everyone else think?  I for one would love scalala in the repo

[David Pollak]

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 4:43 AM, Josh Suereth <joshua....@gmail.com> wrote:

I think maintainers should be the primary requirement (besides the time it takes to set things up on the website end.)

What does everyone else think?  I for one would love scalala in the repo

For the first few weeks, we're going to only go with the packages listed.  Once we're comfortable with the build process, we'll open Fresh Scala up to other packages.  The criteria for new packages is a commitment from a maintainer to fix issues within a short time (24 hours if possible) so that the dependencies don't get gummed up.  Also, any project that's part of Fresh Scala has to be free or open source and hosted in a "common" location (e.g., GitHub, Google Code, Assembla, etc., but not on someone's personal svn or git server.)

Given that Jason has stepped up to work on Scalala, it's met the support criteria... then we just have to wait for the process to stabilize.

 

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 6:09 AM, Jason Zaugg <jza...@gmail.com> wrote:

I recently set up a SBT build for Scalala, and will be happy to
maintain a slot for it in Fresh.

-jason

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 12:03 PM, ijuma <ism...@juma.me.uk> wrote:
> Hey all,
>
> As I said in one of the other mailing lists that this was sent to,
> this is great news.
>

> Is there a set of criteria for libraries to join this effort? I was
> thinking specifically about scalala as it stresses the specialization
> feature of the compiler. I asked in that group[1] and there is
> interest even if scalala is perhaps less mature than some of the other
> libraries in Scala Fresh.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Scala Fresh" group.
To post to this group, send email to scala...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to scala-fresh...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/scala-fresh?hl=en.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Scala Fresh" group.
To post to this group, send email to scala...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to scala-fresh...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/scala-fresh?hl=en.

--
Lift, the simply functional web framework http://liftweb.net
Beginning Scala http://www.apress.com/book/view/1430219890
Follow me: http://twitter.com/dpp
Surf the harmonics

[David Pollak]

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 3:09 AM, Jason Zaugg <jza...@gmail.com> wrote:

I recently set up a SBT build for Scalala, and will be happy to
maintain a slot for it in Fresh.

Awesome.  Once we get the kinks out of the build process, we'll add Scalala

 

-jason

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 12:03 PM, ijuma <ism...@juma.me.uk> wrote:
> Hey all,
>
> As I said in one of the other mailing lists that this was sent to,
> this is great news.
>

> Is there a set of criteria for libraries to join this effort? I was
> thinking specifically about scalala as it stresses the specialization
> feature of the compiler. I asked in that group[1] and there is
> interest even if scalala is perhaps less mature than some of the other
> libraries in Scala Fresh.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Scala Fresh" group.
To post to this group, send email to scala...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to scala-fresh...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/scala-fresh?hl=en.

--
Lift, the simply functional web framework http://liftweb.net
Beginning Scala http://www.apress.com/book/view/1430219890
Follow me: http://twitter.com/dpp
Surf the harmonics

[David Pollak]

On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 3:03 AM, ijuma <ism...@juma.me.uk> wrote:

Hey all,

As I said in one of the other mailing lists that this was sent to,
this is great news.

On May 19, 5:20 am, David Pollak <feeder.of.the.be...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Fresh Scala aims to address this issue.  Fresh Scala is a community
> initiative that provides nightly builds of a collection of popular Scala
> libraries against a stable development branch of Scala.

Is there a set of criteria for libraries to join this effort?

For the first few weeks, we're going to only go with the packages listed.  Once we're comfortable with the build process, we'll open Fresh Scala up to other packages.  The criteria for new packages is a commitment from a maintainer to fix issues within a short time (24 hours if possible) so that the dependencies don't get gummed up.  Also, any project that's part of Fresh Scala has to be free or open source and hosted in a "common" location (e.g., GitHub, Google Code, Assembla, etc., but not on someone's personal svn or git server.)

 

I was

thinking specifically about scalala as it stresses the specialization
feature of the compiler. I asked in that group[1] and there is
interest even if scalala is perhaps less mature than some of the other
libraries in Scala Fresh.

Best,
Ismael

[1] http://groups.google.com/group/scalala/browse_thread/thread/c369568259f25388

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Scala Fresh" group.
To post to this group, send email to scala...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to scala-fresh...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/scala-fresh?hl=en.

--
Lift, the simply functional web framework http://liftweb.net
Beginning Scala http://www.apress.com/book/view/1430219890
Follow me: http://twitter.com/dpp
Surf the harmonics

[Daniel Ramage]

As one of the main Scalala dev's, I think this is great. Thanks, Jason
and fresh folk. I'm looking forward to integrating into the build
processes.

dan

David Pollak wrote:
>
>
> On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 3:09 AM, Jason Zaugg <jza...@gmail.com
> <mailto:jza...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> I recently set up a SBT build for Scalala, and will be happy to
> maintain a slot for it in Fresh.
>
>
> Awesome. Once we get the kinks out of the build process, we'll add Scalala
>
>
>
> -jason
>
> On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 12:03 PM, ijuma <ism...@juma.me.uk
> <mailto:ism...@juma.me.uk>> wrote:
> > Hey all,
> >
> > As I said in one of the other mailing lists that this was sent to,
> > this is great news.
> >
> > Is there a set of criteria for libraries to join this effort? I was
> > thinking specifically about scalala as it stresses the specialization
> > feature of the compiler. I asked in that group[1] and there is
> > interest even if scalala is perhaps less mature than some of the
> other
> > libraries in Scala Fresh.
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "Scala Fresh" group.
> To post to this group, send email to scala...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:scala...@googlegroups.com>.

> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
> scala-fresh...@googlegroups.com

> <mailto:scala-fresh%2Bunsu...@googlegroups.com>.