"Hello world"

[Neil Williams]

On Saturday 23 April 2005 7:32 pm, Daniel Tudosie wrote:
> I have been using gnucash for some time and I am satified for now...
> furthermore, as I have background in IT development (I have studied
> Scheme, I am working as dev in C/C++, etc), I am thinking of getting
> involved in the development of this product...

Excellent! Where would you like to start?!?!?! WELCOME!

(BTW. Did you worry about the delay in getting your message back from the list 
and re-post? I got a duplicate!)
:-)

> Ofcourse I would like to help in the effort of porting gnucash to gnome2
> but my 
> experience in developing under linux is some-how limited (and note that
> I used the term *experience*).

OK. Have you got GUI experience with Gnome2? Do you have GUI experience from 
other toolkits? The largest part of the G2 port is implementing existing 
functions in the 1.8 tree in the new G2 GUI environment - as you'd expect 
from any port really.

Don't be put off by the recent rants on the user list, the devel list works on 
merit alone. If your code and questions are sensible, you'll find it an 
extremely useful list.

I've documented some of my early mistakes on the site linked below, take time 
to read a little of that and you'll avoid treading on toes or making a fool 
of yourself like I did. (Didn't I, Derek!)
:-)

> So I am asking 
> what development env. are you using ? (I am using gnome and I 
> have installed Anjuta which I am not familiar with;

Debian unstable, Anjuta, local CVS, bash. That's about it. I find Anjuta is 
excellent, especially when you are learning the code. Right click any 
function and the Go -> Tag Definition menu is your friend. It's just so 
stable too. It even integrates nicely with CVS.

Don't expect certain Anjuta tools to work, there are a few discrepancies in 
the Gnucash tree compared to what Anjuta expects. e.g. You can't launch Guile 
direct from Anjuta and I can't launch gnucash direct from Anjuta either. 
That's probably for the best because you can launch it from a terminal and 
Anjuta provides that.

> but I am also a fan 
> of gnu emacs) is there a "dev tips and tricks" section that I haven't
> found ?

(I never use emacs, others here do.)

I've put up a little bit:
http://code.neil.williamsleesmill.me.uk/startqof.html
http://code.neil.williamsleesmill.me.uk/startqof.html#GNUCASH-DEBUG

The Wiki is useful too.

Doxygen is your main tool though. The Gnucash site has the 1.8 tree doxygen 
output and I've got the G2 doxygen output here:
http://code.neil.williamsleesmill.me.uk/gnome2/

> For the rest of information (e.g. about specific libraries to be used in
> develpment) I will either search or ask.

To build from CVS on Debian, I've put up a list of the libraries you'll need:
http://code.neil.williamsleesmill.me.uk/preface.html

> So this is just a friendly "Hello world" message to the dev-list (a more
> friendly mail list I hope :-) ).

v.friendly. You'll naturally be told of if you:
1. break the build
2. ask daft questions
3. don't show a willingness to learn

So you're already on the right road.

Take your time, learn from what is already done and ask. That's all I'd 
recommend.

My work revolves around QOF - almost exclusively nowadays. I'm into data 
abstraction, XML, data mining, export, import (especially from other 
applications like pilot-link), objects, merges, documentation and anything 
else that generally makes the GnuCash data more accessible.

I try to avoid GUI work because I know my limits!

-- 

Neil Williams
=============
http://www.dcglug.org.uk/
http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/
http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/

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