7 This file is intended to provide a few tips for anyone doing development on nmh.
8 Developers who learn things "the hard way" about the nmh codebase (as opposed to
9 local info best encoded in a comment) are encouraged to share their wisdom here.
11 The topics are organized alphabetically.
18 If you wish to change the `configure' script or its related files, you'll need
19 to first install GNU m4, available from <ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/m4/> and then
20 GNU autoconf (<ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/autoconf/>). Nmh is currently using
21 a minimum of autoconf 2.54.
23 Most of the configure-related files are automatically generated. The only files
24 you should need to manually edit are acconfig.h and configure.in. Don't, for
25 instance, edit config.h.in. Though it is an input file from the point of view
26 of the users (and the configure script) it is an output file from the point of
27 view of the developers (and the autoconf script).
29 Note that the automatically generated autoconf files (such as config.h.in,
30 stamp-h.in, and configure), are NOT kept in CVS. Thus, when you check out
31 a CVS tree, you need to do the following things before you can build
42 Following is a list of nmh's directories along with a brief description of the
43 purpose of each one. Meanings are given for the abbreviations, but note that
44 these meanings are just informed guesses as to what the MH developers were
48 The top-level directory. Contains files like README and INSTALL.
51 Contains utility files for the `configure' process. Ordinarily nothing in
52 here needs to be messed with.
55 Contains more specialized documentation, such as this file and
59 Contains files, file templates, and scripts to generate files that will be
60 installed in the ${prefix}/etc directory. Stuff like replcomps.
63 Most of nmh's header (.h) files are kept not in the individual source
64 directories, but in this central location.
67 Contains all the input files that are processed to generate nmh's manual
71 "mts" stands for "Message Transfer Service". Source files specific to the
72 different MTSs go in the subdirectories.
74 mts/mmdf/ (deprecated)
75 "mmdf" stands for "Multichannel Memorandum Distribution Facility". It is an
76 alternative to sendmail used primarily on SCO UNIX.
78 mts/sendmail/ (deprecated: handled by mts.conf)
79 When nmh is configured --with-mts=sendmail, the files in this directory are
83 When nmh is configured to just talk to an SMTP server over TCP/IP, the
84 source in this directory is compiled.
87 "sbr" stands for "subroutine(s)". For the most part, each source file in
88 this directory contains a single function with the same name as the source
89 file. These functions are of general use and are called from throughout
93 "uip" stands for "User Interface Programs". Most nmh commands have a file
94 in this directory named <command>.c containing the code for that command
95 (e.g. repl.c). In some cases there is also an auxiliary file called
96 <command>sbr.c which contains additional subroutines called from <command>.c
97 (which would contain not much else besides main()).
100 Files in this hierarchy were either written by or moved here by UCI
101 (University of California, Irvine) after they took over MH from the Rand
102 Corporation. "Zot!" is the sound effect made by the anteater in the "B.C."
103 comic strip when its tongue lashes out at ants. The anteater is UCI's
104 official mascot. Not sure whether UCInet was once called ZotNet...
106 zotnet/bboards/ (deprecated)
107 UCI added Bulletin Board functionality to MH with the `bbc' command. This
108 functionality has been removed from nmh but apparently files in this
109 directory are still needed for other purposes.
111 zotnet/mf/ (deprecated, now in sbr/)
112 "mf" stands for "Mail Filter". The filtering in this case apparently refers
113 to translation between different address and mailbox formats.
115 zotnet/mts/ (deprecated, now in sbr/)
116 MTS code not specific to any single MTS apparently goes here.
118 zotnet/tws/ (deprecated, now in sbr/)
119 "tws" apparently stands for "time with structure", a rather odd phrase.
120 This directory used to be the place for date and time manipulation code, but
121 currently nothing in here is compiled. There are new, more portable
122 versions of the key files in h/ and sbr/, and this directory will soon go
126 -------------------------------------------------------
127 nmh-local functions to use in preference to OS versions
128 -------------------------------------------------------
130 For some system functions whose availability or behavior varies from OS to OS,
131 nmh conditionally uses a local definition with the same name as the OS function
132 (e.g. snprintf()). For other functions, developers need to avoid the OS
133 versions and always use the nmh-supplied function. Here is a list of such
136 OS function nmh-local version to use instead
137 =========== ================================
138 getpass() nmh_getpass()
145 To make a public release of nmh (we'll use version 1.0.4 and my mhost.com
146 account, danh, as examples here; the convention for release candidates
147 is to use something like "1.0.4-RC1"):
149 1. % echo 1.0.4 > VERSION
150 % date +"%e %B %Y" > DATE
151 (DATE should contain something like "30 December 2000")
153 2. Put a comment like "Released nmh-1.0.4." in the ChangeLog.
155 3. % cvs commit ChangeLog VERSION DATE
157 4. % cvs tag nmh-1_0_4
158 (cvs treats dots specially, so underscores are substituted here.)
162 6. Untar nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz and `diff -r' it vs. your CVS tree. Make sure no
163 files got left out of the distribution that should be in it (due to someone
164 forgetting to update the DIST variables in the Makefiles).
166 7. If you have root access on your machine, it's good at this point to do:
168 % chown -R 0:0 nmh-1.0.4
169 % tar cvf nmh-1.0.4.tar nmh-1.0.4
172 If you leave the files in the archive as being owned by yourself, your UID
173 may coincide with one of a user on a machine where nmh is being installed,
174 making it possible for that user to Trojan the nmh code before the system
175 administrator finishes installing it.
177 8. Make sure your new tarball uncompresses and untars with no problem. Make
178 sure you can configure, make, and install nmh from it.
180 9. If all is well and your tarball is final, go back to your CVS tree and do:
182 % echo 1.0.4+dev > VERSION
184 10. Put a comment like "Upped the version number to 1.0.4+dev until the next nmh
185 release." in the ChangeLog.
187 11. % cvs commit ChangeLog VERSION
189 12. If possible, make an MD5 hash and/or a PGP signature of nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz.
190 Assuming you have gpg set up, this should be:
191 % gpg --output nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz.sig --detach-sig nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz
193 You can verify the signature with
194 % gpg --verify nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz.sig nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz
196 13. Upload the files to savannah. First make sure they are mode 664 so
197 they will have the right permissions on the server end
198 (see https://savannah.gnu.org/maintenance/SharedDownloadArea)
199 % chmod 664 nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz*
201 Then scp them across:
202 % scp -p nmh-1.0.4.tar.gz* youruser@dl.sv.nongnu.org:/releases/nmh/
204 14. FIXME -- I suspect that at least some of the mailing lists here are not
205 correct any more. Needs checking.
207 Send an announcement to exmh-users@redhat.com, exmh-workers@redhat.com,
208 mh-users@ics.uci.edu, and nmh-announce@mhost.com. If the release fixes
209 significant security holes, also send an announcement to
210 bugtraq@securityfocus.com. The exmh lists require you to be subscribed in
211 order to post. Note that you don't need to post separately to comp.mail.mh,
212 as the mh-users mailing list is apparently bidirectionally gatewayed to it.
214 Preferably, the announcement should contain the MD5 hash generated above,
215 and should be PGP-signed. It should include the FTP URL for the tarball as
216 well as the URL of the website. It should contain a brief summary of
217 visible changes, as well as the URL of the cvsweb diff page that would show
218 a detailed list of changes. The changes between 1.0.3 and 1.0.4 would be
221 http://www.mhost.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb/nmh/ChangeLog?r1=1.40&r2=1.71
223 15. Add a news item to the savannah nmh page. You'll have to submit it first
224 and then separately approve it (under News->Manage).
226 16. Update the http://www.nongnu.org/nmh/ homepage. (It lives in the 'webpages
227 repository'; see https://savannah.nongnu.org/cvs/?group=nmh)