Familiar v0.8.4-rc1 released

Familiar v0.8.4-rc1 released
----------------------------

A new release candidate is available. For technical reasons [2] we have
switched to the 0.8.4 "namespace" - think of 0.8.4 as what should have
been 0.8.3.

Support for new devices
-----------------------

In addition to the traditional platforms, v0.8.4-rc1 (like the 0.8.3
release candidates before) comes with initial support for the following
devices:

. iPAQ h2200 series ("h2200")
. iPAQ hx4700 series ("ipaq-pxa270")
. iPAQ h6300 series ("h6300")

Think of the images for these devices as a technology preview for more
experienced users. Less experienced users are advised to stay away from
these images until the devices are declared fully supported and
official Familiar installation instructions are available which is
unfortunately not yet the case.

With a little help from the ports projects we hope to have them more or
less fully working in the final v0.8.4 release (within the limitations
of the individual hardware and kernel support for it).

For the above devices, please refer to the documentation provided by the
ports projects (primarily in the handhelds.org wiki) for installation
instructions for now. The Familiar documentation at [1] will be adjusted
soon.

Changes in v0.8.4-rc1
---------------------

Apart from various bugfixes, the most notable change since the last
release candidate images is that internationalization (i18n) generally
works again on all devices, since glibc locale data is now generated at
build time [3] (which also speeds up the initial boot).

Unfortunately, there's still a bug left in either ipkg or the
dependencies of some packages so that not all locale files for every
application are present in the default images. For devices with enough
flash this will be fixed in -rc2, fixed packages may hit the feeds
earlier.

Images
------

Images in .jffs2 (flash image) and .tar.bz2 (for debugging purposes or
to be extracted on external media. don't try to flash them!) format are
available from:

http://familiar.handhelds.org/releases/v0.8.4-rc1/images

The h3600 opie images are a bit large right now. That will be addressed
with -rc2.

Feeds
-----

Initial feeds are available from:

http://familiar.handhelds.org/releases/v0.8.4-rc1/feed/

Note that the feed structure has changed compared to previous releases
(and the 0.8.3 rc feeds). There are now five main feeds:

base - essential packages
updates - security and bugfix updates go in this feed
common - additional packages not specific to any graphical environment
opie - additional packages specific to the opie graphical environment
x11 - additional packages specific to the x11 graphical environment

There are subfeeds for individual machines and locales in each of the
main feeds.

Also, unlike previous v0.8.x feeds, the v0.8.4-rc1 feeds do not contain
the result of an OpenEmbedded "world build" (try to build everything,
ignore errors). Instead, the set of packages now in the feeds represents
what is meant to be working. That said, the feeds are not final yet
(thus the -rc1), more packages may be added on a by-case basis.

Chances are that because of the above changes you will be missing
packages in the 0.8.4-rc1 feeds. A dedicated bugzilla component will
be created so that you can request for more packages to be added. I
will send another announcement with detailed instructions soon.

Due to the huge number of perl-module-* packages, perl was moved to
a separate, temporary, "perl" feed until the packaging is fixed. This
feed is not enabled by default, you will need to add a corresponding
line to /etc/ipkg/*.conf yourself if you want to use it.

Upgrading from previous releases
--------------------------------

Upgrading to v0.8.4-rc1 via "ipkg upgrade" is currently not recommended.
We will, however, try to make sure it will work with the final v0.8.4
release.

If you feel adventurous and want to help testing anyway, make sure to
run "ipkg install ipkg" before trying to upgrade anything else.

Reporting bugs
--------------

The primary reason for another release candidate is to get feedback from
users. For general feedback please use the mailing list. For specific
issues please don't hesitate to file bugs in bugzilla:

http://bugzilla.handhelds.org/

Also, don't worry about getting the product/component wrong in bugzilla.
It can be adjusted afterwards.

A list of already known critical bugs for v0.8.4 is available at:

http://bugzilla.handhelds.org/showdependencytree.cgi?id=1602

Note that various bugs are already fixed with this release candidate.
I will update the bugzilla entries in question soon.

I'd like to thank everyone who has helped make this release candidate
happen! Let's keep up the good work and get a polished final v0.8.4 out!

Regards,

Rene

[1] http://familiar.handhelds.org/
[2] http://handhelds.org/hypermail/familiar-dev/7/0797.html
[3] http://bugzilla.handhelds.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1385

-- 
Rene Wagner
rw at handhelds dot org
4F33 7FD7 93B3 166B BADA  D6F8 71A1 FEA8 58B4 36D0