[Serusers] Re: [Serdev] new stable release: ser 0.9.3

[Jan Janak]

Hello,

There is a couple of new things in the new release, here is a summary:

SER:

   Most of you have been using one of 0.9.x pre-releases already so
   you probably know what to expect from it. The tarballs/packages
   contain updated documentation. In this release we did not put
   the additional documentation on the ftp server, instead we will
   generate web pages from it (aiming at automatic updates). In addition
   to that we tried to test all the stuff together (serweb, ser, rtpproxy,
   radius).

SERWeb:

  - Karel polished serweb. There is now an data abstraction layer so it is
    possible to use serweb with both mysql and postgres databases

  - We renamed the serweb cvs repository, using a more logical name. The new
    CVSROOT for serweb is
    :pserver:anonymous at cvs.berlios.de:/cvsroot/serweb

  - SERWeb adopted the versioning scheme of SER, so for every SER release
    there will be serweb release with same major version (minor -- the last
    number can differ and still compatibility will be guaranteed).

  - We now have dedicated mailing lists for SERWeb:
  
    http://lists.iptel.org/mailman/listinfo/serweb-users
    http://lists.iptel.org/mailman/listinfo/serweb-dev
  
  - SERWeb is now extensible, it is possible to change the layout of the
    pages, create templates, and translate SERWeb into other languages.

  - It is now possible to enter username at domain in log-in window and this
    feature is enabled by default. There was quite some amount of confusion
    when serweb was running on a machine with different domain than the
    domain in the subscriber database. This problem is hopefully gone now
    when users can specify the domain manually.

  - There is a debian package which tracks all the dependencies and allows
    easy installation and configuration. More packages are underway.
    
  - Serweb tarball for this release can be found at:
    ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/ser/0.9.3/contrib
    
SEMS:

  Sems is the only piece that is still missing in this release, it will
  be added later.
    
Packaging:

  In this release we put quite a lot of effort into integrating all the
  components together (ser, serweb, mysql, radius, postgres, rtpproxy).
  As a result we now have an APT repository and Debian packages for all
  of them.

  Debian users can put the following URL in their /etc/apt/sources.list:

  deb http://apt.sip-router.org/debian/ stable main contrib non-free
  deb-src http://apt.sip-router.org/debian/ stable main contrib non-free
  
  We have packages for all three distributions, users of testing or
  unstable releases can simply replace stable with testing and/or unstable.

  The repository currently contains the following packages:

  libilbc0              -- internet Low Bit Rate Codec Library
  jrtplib               -- RTP Library
  libradiusclient-ng2   -- Maxim's radiusclient-ng library
  rtpproxy              -- Maxim's RTPProxy
  ser-acc-db-module     -- SER acc module with database support
  ser-acc-radius-module -- SER acc module with database and radius support
  ser-cpl-module        -- SER cpl-c module
  ser-jabber-module     -- SER jabber module
  ser-mysql-module      -- MySQL support for ser
  ser-pa-module         -- Jamey's Presence Agent
  ser-postgres-module   -- Greg's Postgres support for SER
  ser-radius-modules    -- Juha's RADIUS support for SER
  ser                   -- The core and basic modules
  serweb                -- SERWeb

  This will hopefully simplify installation and configuration of all
  the software. In general we would like to divert people from using CVS
  versions and provide binary packages and easy way of installation for
  major linux distributions.

  Updates of the repository can be automated to large extent. For stable
  SER releases we would like to try fully automatic updates -- packages
  will be automatically generated when a bug is fixed in CVS and uploaded.
  Users can simply keep their installations up-to-date using apt.

  We are also preparing similar repository yum repository for users of
  fedora and redhat based distributions. I hope to have it online by the
  end of the week.

  It would be also possible to setup similar system for other distributions,
  but for that we would need some support from external people. Please drop
  me a line if you are willing to help with building packages for your
  favorite distribution.

  For unstable releases, there are debian packages generated daily from
  cvs snapshots at ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/ser/cvs-snapshots
  This is an experimental feature and we are planning to move it into
  the APT repository as well.

RADIUS Support:

  The radius library has been renamed. This necessary for the debian packages
  because otherwise the library files would conflict with the original
  radius library and could not be installed on the same system at the same
  time.

  From version 0.5.0 all include files and libraries are named radiusclient-ng
  (radiusclient-ng.h and libradiusclient-ng.so).
  Users of 0.4.x versions can still continue using older versions. When 
  compiling ser you can specify the library version on the command line:
  make all radiusclient_ng=4
  Versions 0.3.x are no more supported.

CVS:

  There is a new CVS module called experimental, administered by Greger V. Teigre.
  More information can be found here:
  http://www.iptel.org/~janakj/ser_cvs.xhtml

Bug Tracker:

  We now have a bug tracking system for SER and related software running at
  http://bugs.sip-router.org
  
  I would like to encourage anyone to use the bug tracking system for reporting
  bugs and asking for feature enhancements. It is possible to attach additional
  data, such as configuration files and error logs to bugs. There is no need
  to have an account in the bug tracker in order to report a bug (although it
  is recommended because then you can receive status updated by email).

  Please make sure that all important bugs and feature requests are in there,
  otherwise it can happen that they will simply disappear in the noise of
  the mailing lists.
  
Release Scheme:

  Most likely there will be some changes in the way how SER gets released,
  because we will need it to make the automatic package generation possible
  and it has also become a hot topic on the mailing lists recently :-).

  More details will follow on serdev, in short we will probably keep one
  stable branch in CVS (this does not change) where only bug fixes will
  be allowed, nothing else. Upon each update the minor version number will
  be incremented and a new release generated. Anyone who fixes a bug in CVS
  should have the possibility to do this and it should be very quick, making
  fast bug-fix updates possible.

  We are also trying to automate the release process as much as possible,
  which hopefully would result in faster release cycles.
  
On behalf of all the people behind SER I would like to take this opportunity 
to thank everyone helping with this. Special thanks this time go to 
Greger V. Teigre, Paul Hazlett, and Simon Miles for writing and
maintaining excellent documentation at http://onsip.org and helping others
on the mailing lists.

   Jan.