Ganymede Developer's Release 2 Available

[Jonathan Abbey <jonabbey@arlut.utexas.edu>]

Ganymede developer pre-release 2, dev2.tar.gz, is now available from

 ftp://ftp.arlut.utexas.edu/pub/ganymede/

 or

 ftp://129.116.212.1/pub/ganymede/

if your client has trouble resolving a proper address for
ftp.arlut.utexas.edu.

If you are working with any dev1 release, we heartily recommend
picking up this release and working with it instead.

This release does not yet include a working NIS makefile for use with
the nisonly schema, as we have not yet determined how to best
construct one that would be applicable to all platforms that the
Ganymede server might conceivably run on.  Instead, we have documented
in the INSTALL file how to create an 'nisbuilder' script that the
Ganymede server will run for you if you want to put Ganymede into
production managing users and groups.

Here is the changes log for this dev release.

 -------------------- Changes from dev1b to dev2 --------------------
 
 RELEASE DATE: 27 April 1998
 
 Following are the most significant changes since dev1b.  There are a
 number of additional small performance and behavior improvements
 throughout.  We have continued to evolve the ARL Ganymede schema
 and custom code, which has prompted us to enrich the customization
 plug-in classes to allow for needed functionality.  The ARL schema
 is not yet ready for release, but our work on it is driving the
 improvement of the system generally.
 
 1. [SERVER] Deadlock Prevention.
 
  There were a number of cases in which the server could become
 deadlocked due to a nested-monitor condition.  We have corrected a
 good number of these, and the server should be far less susceptible to
 deadlocked threads.
 
 2. [SERVER] Transactions Can Fail Without Mandatory Abort.
 
  The server now has the ability to have a transaction fail without
 having to throw out the entire transaction.  This is built on the
 checkpoint logic in DBEditSet and DBEditObject.
 
 3. [CUSTOM] DBEditObject Customization Class Enriched.
 
  We have added a method to DBEditObject that will allow custom
 plug-ins on the server to specify what fields must be filled in at
 commit time.  The server's commit engine uses (2.) above to return an
 explanatory dialog to the client, allowing the user to fill in the
 additional required fields before trying to re-commit the transaction.
 
  In addition, the DBEditObject class now has the ability for an object
 to determine for itself when it should be considered owned by the
 current Ganymede administrator, as well as the ability to return
 expanded or restricted permissions as needed.
 
 4. [CLIENT/SERVER] Client Automatically Refreshes Object Pointers.
 
  The server now returns to the client a list of objects and fields
 that need to be updated in response to an action by the client.  The
 basic object linking code automatically handles this, so whenever you
 change an object reference pointer with the client, you will see
 affected references in other windows update.  There are still a couple
 of cases in which this is not yet handled correctly, including when a
 change to an object causes the object's label to change, and in
 certain cases when objects are deleted.
 
 5. [SERVER] String Relative Compares Work In Query.
 
  Before, if you attempted to use >, >=, <, or <= in a string field in
 the Ganymede query mechanism, you would not get any results back.
 Relative string comparisons is now working properly.
 
 6. [CLIENT] Several GUI Fixes.
 
  The calendar panel now shows up correctly.  The GUI logic for the
 vector of embedded objects has a number of bug fixes.  More.
 
 7. [CUSTOM] Now Using *Schema.java Files To Enumerate Fields.
 
  The custom code associated with the provided schema files now use
 symbolic constants to refer to fields in the customized object types.
 This should make that code easier to read and maintain.
 
 8. [CLIENT/SERVER] Permissions System Now Has Delete Bit.
 
  The permissions system now maintains a delete permission that is
 distinct from an edit permission.  It is now possible to allow an
 administrator permission to edit an object while denying that
 administrator deletion privileges.  The permissions editor currently
 shows the delete bit as applying to object fields as well as objects,
 but currently the server only consults the delete bit when an attempt
 is made to remove, inactivate, or reactivate objects.
 
 9. [CUSTOM] GASH Schema Uses Properties.
 
  We have made the GASH schema custom code use a couple of properties
 to specify the default home directory location and default email
 address suffix.  You will be prompted for the values for these
 properties when you run the installServer.perl script.  We may
 want to move these out of the ganymede.properties file and into the
 database proper to make it possible to change these values without
 having to stop and restart the server.
 
  installServer.perl should be smart enough not to prompt for these
 properties if the user is not installing the GASH schema.

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Jonathan Abbey				              jonabbey@arlut.utexas.edu
Applied Research Laboratories                 The University of Texas at Austin
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To see the latest design specs for Ganymede, visit the Ganymede web page
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