Revision as of 18:23, 29 October 2007

WTP Architecture Working Group

Plans

• Update our high level architecture document

• Make current with how things currently are (add, JSF, JPA, DTP, etc.)
• Make current with how we want things to be (improved componentization, etc)
• Make a Projects View
• Make a Features View

• Make recommendations that are important to release 3.0, such as

• Can we install and/or enable proper capabilities for various install scenarios?
• Should/can some plugins move to better components/features?

• Work with project leads for the "bottoms up" perspective, and address what's realistic

Minutes 9/14

Attendees: Konstantin, Nitin, Cameron, David W, Tim dB

Some of the discussion topics:

• Long term, should/can we use the build to enforce architecture?

• We can build things separately, but build currently assumes things go in a single order, i.e. once things are built they are available to all future components that build.

• Should the foundation supply build infrastructure?

• They already provide machines and much infrastructure.
• Build project has been suggested before, and other teams have tried to promote their build technology. There has been little interest.
• Maybe just common scripts or mechanisms for sharing?

• WTP structure is now several projects, each with core vs UI and wst vs jst split.

• Suggestion of packaging individual features or components for download. Could be on a separate download page, but would allow adopters to get exactly what they want.

• Is that overkill?
• Unclear how 3.4 provisioning work might affect features.

• We should break components up as wst/jst when we look at dependencies.
• Will want to eventually investigate core/UI split too.

• Should tests be included as part of a component?

• In practice we should have component level tests (part of a component) and project/cross-component tests. In reality most tests are component level, but some components have cross-component tests too.
• General agreement we should look at our dependencies without tests (to investigate the clean/runtime view of things) and also compare to see what dependencies tests add.

• Discussed Konstantin's visualization tool, Tim's dependency tool

• Cyclic dependencies are bad. :)

• What about other dependencies, esp. JDT?

• Should come up with a view of what requires JDT and what doesn't.
• JEM and EMF both have non-JDT/JDT split as well.

Actions:

• Konstantin: Check on legal issues and send out source to tool
• Tim: Start modifying tool to read K's component format, start editing existing wiki page, setup next meeting

Minutes 9/24

Attendees: Nitin, Tim dB

- canceled since nobody else showed up!

• review last minutes
• finish discussion
• action items
• where to go?

Meeting 10/1

Attendees: Konstantin, Nitin, Cameron, Tim

• minutes lost, thanks to a Windows blue screen

Meeting 10/9

Date: Tuesday, October 9th

Time: 2pm EDT/11am PDT

Attendees:

Topics: API, best practises

October 22nd

Features

• Core & UI shouldn't be split without specific reason, other feature splits (docs?) may not make as much sense either
• We're not going to redo all of WTP, but we should have an overall architectural plan
• interest is in starting with some of the core components - creating better features and separate downloads to promote reuse
• discussed of the chicken & egg problem with separating out features and having adopters
• decided that facets & snippets are the most logical components for reuse

Action items:

• 1 - Write up policy on feature design for review (Tim)
• 2 - Send note to community to get feedback on facets & snippets split, other ideas (Nitin)
• 3 - Investigate dependencies and build changes required to make the split (Konstantin, Tim)
• 4 - Send note to broader community (projects & users) to increase awareness and get feedback (later)

Internal API Usage

• Reviewed current policy of usage scans, why it was adopted, and the need for a new policy
• Suggestion of a grandfather date whereby we no longer accept usage scans
• Discussed how our deprecation policy (for API, internal, and provisional) is tightly tied to this
• Discussed the need to separate between legitimate v.s non-legitimate usage
• Need some form of component/project 'graduation' from internal usage policy

Action item:

• Write up a new policy for review (Tim)

Oct 29th meeting

Reviewed action items and spend most of the time discussing our API policy:

http://wiki.eclipse.org/WTP_API_Policy

Next meeting

Date: Monday, November 5th

Time: 2pm EDT/11am PDT

Call-in Info: 1 866-245-5059 Passcode: 4203514

Review feature architecture policy

Review deprecation and internal usage policy

Update on action items

Start of a new wiki page: http://wiki.eclipse.org/WTP_Projects_and_Features