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From: Rene Rivera (grafikrobot_at_[hidden])
Date: 2008-01-23 12:42:54


Beman Dawes wrote:
> Are you saying that the root index.html pages for the release and the
> web site have different content?

Yes.

> How do users who need the web site content locally download it?

They don't. A user should not need the web site content to use the release.

> Does the web site contain all the content of the release? Even if they
> aren't physically integrated, how are they logically integrated?

Logically the docs for each release is available in the web site. In the
docs section you can browse those docs for each release. For example for
1.34.1 <http://beta.boost.org/doc/libs/1_34_1>. Physically the web site
has a copy of the ZIP archive for the release and unpacks and presents
those docs dynamically.

> Something has to happen to keep the release and the web site in sync.

Sure :-) But the goal was to minimize the connection in order to make
updating the web site much easier, and to make the release process less
work...

> I've been assuming that it is the same process as in past releases. When
> the release is ready, the release manager copies it to the web server.

"Copy it to the web server" is still the essential step. But instead of
copying a bunch of files you copy the ZIP archive and edit the web site
to use "publish" it.

> Is there a writeup somewhere of this new scheme? I'm lost.

Not yet, since I avoid writing docs for something I haven't actually
done yet ;-) So here's the planned steps (reality may vary):

* Create the release (docs, archive, whatever)
* Upload the ZIP archive, boost_1_35_0.zip, to the server. Currently it
would be to /home/grafik/www.boost.org/archives/live
* Edit the beta web site content to show the new release. Some of the
edits can happen even before the archive is uploaded...

Edits:

* Add new libraries to the library list
<http://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/browser/website/public_html/beta/doc/libraries.xml>.

* Edit the docs display to ensure that the docs for each library display
correctly. This is the hardest step so far since there's some magic PHP
code doing this
<http://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/browser/website/public_html/beta/doc/display_libs.php>.
* Add the release to the history
<http://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/browser/website/public_html/beta/feed/history>
and edit the downloads to make it the active release
<http://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/browser/website/public_html/beta/feed/build.jam#L58>.
Then rebuild the RSS feeds. The general procedure for this is documented
  at <http://beta.boost.org/development/website_updating.html#Feeds>.

And as the last step, merge the changes from the beta site
<http://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/browser/website/public_html/beta> to
the live site
<http://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/browser/website/public_html/live>. With
the obvious testing in between to make sure that the content is correct
in the beta site before pushing it to the live site ;-)

Note, some of those edits above are what I need to work on now. And I
should say that I'm always trying to make the editing as simple as
possible so things may change as I work through the actual steps and
figure out how to automate the work.

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