[Sablevm-developer] trying SableVM in Debian

[Grzegorz P. <ga...@de...>]

Hi!

There has been RFP (Request for packaging) filled on SableVM.
I have not yet decided to get on it, to create and maintain SableVM
in Debian - I'd like to try it first. And I have a couple of questions.
Please Cc: me as I am not subscribed to the list.

1. I fetched all three source tarballs.
sablevm and sablevm-native-library compiled w/o problems but
how am I supposed to compile sablevm-class-library when there's
no autogen/configure/Makefile in it?
I think I _could_ copy them from original classlib sources, but
it ain't right soulution. Is this an oversight or are there reasons
for not including any build machinery into this source tarball?

2. More general. I looked at changelog and TODO list to get some
impression in what state SableVM is ATM. However I'd like to ask
you few simple question.
- can I use jar files w/o problems (it was mentioned in changelog
as done, but in TODO list there was sth. about zip files not being
supported and jars treated as zips - so finally not sure here)
- what classpath integration pieces are missing?=20
Can I use their gtk-peers? What will those missing pieces impact?
- do you see yourself as research mainly project? I mean - do you
want your JVM to be developed and used seriously or...
- Currently we seem to have a lot free JVMs available. Why is your
so different? better than the others? - so you decided to hack on
that one not on them?
- how would you compare your JVM with classpath duo to what kaffe
is (technically)? Do you have any (more-less accurate) benchmarks?
Can you run all the apps that kaffe can run? more? less?
Where are the problems? When will they probably be solved?

I'd like to know what you can say about the above. If I decide to
carry on maintaining SableVM - I'd like to know what I am putting
myself into.

From practical POV - we (in Debian) don't really need tenth JVM that
works just like all the other. So far it seems that you're better
because of:
1. no licensing problems (kaffe and it's libs are GPL)
2. support for jars (strange, but some other free JVMs need to have
classes unpacked first - which is hardly acceptable)
3. integration with classpath (java 1.2, a bit more than kaffe has)

Thank you for all your answers and thoughts. Please Cc: me.

Best regards

					Grzegorz B. Prokopski