Re: [Help-smalltalk] [RFH] writing hacker's guide

[Paolo Bonzini]

> What's the "charter" for the page? The link to it from the main wikipage
> is "Working on the GNU Smalltalk standard packages".
>
> I've written a noddy introductory sentence at the top of the page. Does
> that fit the intent? If not, feel free to delete or edit it.

Not much, though your intentions are good FAQ candidates.  They will 
remain in the wiki history, so you can overwrite them freely.

What I meant was things that border between "using GST" and 
"contributing to GST":

- I think I found a bug in the kernel.  How do I try to fix it (assuming 
one does not have write access to /usr/share/smalltalk/kernel, or does 
not want to modify those files before having a definitive fix)?  How do 
I work within the tarball's build tree?  How do I test it?  How do I 
apply it to future images I generate (using ~/.st/pre.st or the 
~/.st/kernel directory)?

Given your last patch, you probably can answer this.

- Likewise for standard packages.  A bit more complicated because one 
has to regenerate the .star files within the build tree, and move them 
to ~/.st manually from there.

- Basics of how to use gdb to debug GNU Smalltalk modules.  You also can 
answer this, probably.

- How do I include a new package in GNU Smalltalk's tarball? (usually I 
do it actually, people just point me to a tarball generated with 
`gst-package --prepare'; later on we might refine the process, 
especially after I switch to a better VCS).

> I'm unsure what to do about the warning re: filing of copyright
> assignment that is mentioned on the "missing manual pages" page. Should
> there be one on the Hacker's Guide? Would it discourage contributions
> from random people?

No, I don't believe one is necessary for the hacker's guide.

Paolo