[gnome-love] Jhbuild, DVCS and gnome love workflow

["Dmitrijs Ledkovs" <dmitrij ledkov gmail com>]

Hello Gnome Love =D

== Intro ==

I'm learning to program with GTK+ using Foundation of Gtk+ development
book and already starting to learn Gnome codebase while finding
suitable gnome-love bugs for me to fix.

Currently I started to use JHbuild and I have some questions on a
workflow I should use for building, hacking, testing, creating patch,
testing patch and submitting it.

== Current Workflow ==

I used to clone from git-mirror. Then I would get dependencies like this:
$ sudo apt-get install build-dep # i'm using Ubuntu 8.04

Then I would build the fancy new app (e.g. Epiphany or Empathy I like
them a _lot_) into /usr/local and happily use it. Once a week or so
pulling updates recompiling and continuing to use it =D.

== Future Workflow ==

Now I want to start fixing bugs =D and I'm a bit confused. Naturally I
would create a branch in git, do 5-10 commits to finally fix a bug.
Recompile, test, test, test, then pull updates on master branch and
create a diff / patch between the two. And submit it to the
bugzilla/mailing lists/maintainers.

== But JHBuild ==

Hmmmm........ I'm suppose to hack on the code it checked-out after
$ jhbuild build epiphany
and test my changes using it, and then do diff between mywork and the
previous state of jhbuild? Cause I don't understand how significant it
is to use everything from jhbuild instead of my distribution repo's?
Cause my bugfixing is long from depending on bleeding edge build
enviromnet.

== Conclusion ==

Please explain whether JHbuild is used just to test compete new gnome
or whether it should also be used during bug fixing?

Please confirm if it is ok to use combined current+future workflow for
working on a particular gnome app and submitting patches to the
bugzilla.

Or please prepose alternative workflow with preferably git/bzr. Cause
git is the first scm I used/learned and bzr is easy =D.

--
With best regards



Dmitrijs Ledkovs