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List:       osdl-lsb-discuss
Subject:    [lsb-discuss] Beta 2 - LSB appchecker
From:       Robert Schweikert <robert.schweikert () mathworks ! com>
Date:       2008-11-30 13:55:16
Message-ID: 49329B44.6000601 () mathworks ! com
[Download RAW message or body]

I finally got around to give the app checker in the Beta 2 release a
spin. Sorry for the delay, I know we are coming up on the release
quickly and time to get things fixed is running out. Here are the notes
I took while testing. Some of these should probably be entered as bugs,
which I have not done).

This is great progress as compared to the previous version.

Hope everyone celebrating Thanksgiving had a nice holiday.
Robert

TEST Notes:
Testing the app-checker, notes about the overall experience/usability
including
information provided on the web and the application.

- Package from Beta 4.0 site

  - No README file or INSTALL file
    - Should tell me what is going to be instlled and how to install, or
should
      point me to a web page with these instructions.
    - The instructions, i.e. run install.sh having are on the page with the
      package. However, this is insufficient. It is very likely that the
user
      glanced over them when looking for the package to download.

  - Questions from install.sh do not provide a default or a hint of what is
    expected y/n or yes/no?
    - Different internal defaults, giving no input to "Is this correct?"
after
      package system inspection results in install.sh exiting. Giving no
      input to "You have sudo available.  Should I use it?" results in
      install.sh continuing.
      - Should always exit if there is no answer.

  - Must be installed as root, only RPM packages Why? Should be able to
    install as non root user!
    The Beta site and ultimately the page containing the released version
    should provide access to the "local" package as well.

  - Error reporting during installation must be more robust. There
either are
    errors or ther are none. The statement
    "There may have been problems with the package installation.  Check
     error-log.txt for more information."
    is ambiguous, what does it mean to maybe have errors?
 
  - The reported errors and warnings have no clasification, i.e.
explanation of
    the effect of the particular error or warning on my ability to run the
    application checker.
    "error: failed to stat /var/lib/gdm/.gvfs: Permission denied"
    What does this mean?
 
  - Nice messaging at the end of the install process, this should also be
    written to some file for later reference. The user should be
informed about
    the file that contanis this information. As a user I am much more
likely to
    remeber a file name than a URL.
    - This message did not get displayed on Ubuntu 7.04, how do I now know
      how to run the checker? Where did the message go?

  - There should be an uninstall script.

  - Missing key produces a warning:
    warning: lsb-app-checker-3.97.0-1.i486.rpm: Header V4 DSA signature:
    NOKEY, key ID 44facb2f
    (One such warning on OpenSuse 11, 126 warnings on Ubuntu 7.04)

  - During install there should be a progress tracker.


- Inconsistent naming between the local package and the "root" install tar
  ball.
  lsb-app-checker-3.97.0-1.ia32.tar.gz vs.
  Linux-app-checker-local-4.0.0-1.i486.tar.gz
  Pick one and stick with it.

- Getting started page
(http://ispras.linuxfoundation.org/index.php/Linux_App_Checker_Getting_Started)

  - Referes to "Linux-app-checker...." but the user just
    downloaded lsb-app-checker-3.97.0-1.ia32.tar.gz from the beta site, and
    presumambly from the 4.0 release page.
 
  - Refers to "./linux-app-checker" but the package from the beta site
    created lsb-app-checker, the loacl package creates this directory.
 
  - Refers to "install.pl" but the install script is "install.sh", at least
    in the tar ball obtained from the beta site

  - Message at the end of install process is different than the
instructions
    on the getting started page.
    "Use /opt/lsb/app-checker/bin/app-checker-start.pl to run Linux
AppChecker."
    vs.
    "/opt/lsb/app-checker/bin/app-checker-start.pl [port-number]
     You may need to enter the root password."

    Also, why the port number is needed should be explained in this
section,
    and not below. Or provide a hint that the port number explanation
will be
    given below. Locality of information is important.

  - When I am being told how to start the web server, tell me how to
stop it
    or tell me that I will be told later, otherwise I need to scroll the
page
    to find the information and satisfy my curiosity.

  - The page refers to the "<app-checker-dir>/README file", but the package
    from the beta site does not have this file, the local package has this
    file.

  - Refers to "/var/opt/lsb/app-checker/utils", but the package from the
beta
    site installed "/opt/lsb/app-checker/utils/"

  - The second bullet in item 1.) in the CLI section makes no sense.
What are
    "the installed packages"?

  - Should give the default for the --lsb command line option under 2.) in
    the CLI section


- App checker web-ui

  - There are red * next to "Name" and "Components" on the first
"Application
    Check" page, but no explanation is given what this means. One can
infere
    from common usage of the web tha red * means required, but explicitely
    pointing this out is probably a god thing.

  - Components selection dialog is much better than it used to be. I
like the
    link to the help that explains why this is not a standard file selection
    dialog. Nice job. That this is modeled after the Gmail web interface
will
    help many users as far as usability is concerned.

  - Like the progress reporting page and how the individual categories get
    updated as the various file types are found.

  - App checker appears to hang. Pointing the app checker at a directory
    containing 88K files has the app checker still creating a file list
after
    10 minutes. Running a find -type f on the same directory takes only
    3 seconds. I understand that the classification into shell scripts,
    shared libraries, executables, unknown types etc. takes time, but 30+
    minutes appears to be excessive.

 
- Local package

  - README file is much improved from previous versions.

  - Why would I need rpm2cpio on Debian based systems for the local version,
    no RPMS are getting installed?

- LDN getting started page

  - Not all the information from the wiki
   
(http://ispras.linuxfoundation.org/index.php/Linux_App_Checker_Getting_Started)
    is made available on the LDN page
   
(http://ldn.linuxfoundation.org/lsb/lsb-application-testkit-getting-started#Using_Web-UI)
    but I think it should be.


Overall the improvement from previous versions is fantastic. Many of the
issues
are related to what appears to be a gratuitous rename. The inconsistencies
introduced by this rename are really annoying and should be eliminated
before
LSB 4.0 is released. This is tedious work but makes all the difference
in the
world from a usability point of view.

Unfortunately I still cannot test my app.

-- 
Robert Schweikert                           MAY THE SOURCE BE WITH YOU
(robert.schweikert@mathworks.com)                        LINUX
The MathWorks Inc.
Phone: 508-647-2042

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