August 2023 - Wine-Devel - list.winehq.org

Re: The future of WineConf

by Giovanni Mascellani

Hi, Il 23/08/23 22:22, Zeb Figura ha scritto: >> I think WineConf could benefit from more talks that are discussing not >> "what was achieved"/news but rather how and in great depth. >> >> I would absolutely love to see talks from either you or Gofman, or >> whoever doing deep dives into whatever crazy shit that I know nothing >> about, random crazy stuff games do, ancient stuff like dshow, all the >> weird red-herrings to fixing a bug. > It sounds like what you're looking for is entertainment, at least primarily. > And while I think there's certainly value in that, and also that an > informative talk which is not engaging lacks something important, I also can't > help but feel like it's not worth holding a conference for talks which for the > most part aren't going to impart some valuable and useful information. I can't answer for Joshua, but I didn't read his answer as primarily oriented to entertainment. I think there are a lot of valuable lessons and knowledge in the kind of topics he mentions, and of course some entertainment too. I also would like to have more in-depth content about Wine (and related projects) at WineConf (or in whatever other form: any other conference event, blog posts, developer screen casts). For example, I would like to know more about the internals of WoW64, ARM emulation and all the glue that does or will make Wine working on foreing architectures, but there is basically no content around. I could spend a lot of time reading the code and recovering the intentions from it, but it would be globally more efficient if somebody who already knows spent a modest amount of time giving a presentation about that, which would allow me and possibly other interested folks getting up to speed quicker. (and yes, I realize that could go in the other way too: even while being relatively young in Wine I probably have something to share that is not so obvious yet interesting for somebody else; that was my main motivation for contributing my talk to WineConf 2022, though I'm not sure the final result was really in the right direction) > I imagine that the scope of XDC is much broader, too, and so it is easier to > find new information. Or, alternatively, the number of XDC contributors is > much higher, so whereas one can get a pretty holistic picture of what's > happening in the Wine world just from watching wine-devel, that's not possible > with Mesa and all its related projects. > > (And, to be quite frank, I get the impression that there are many XDC > presenters who are much more charismatic than I am, or experienced at making > engaging presentations. It's only a vague impression, since I didn't actually > attend any such XDC presentations. Regardless, there's only so much effort I > can put into presenting.) From my view point, the technical presentations are precisely those where I really care about the content, much less about the presenter's charisma. Indeed it's not unheard of, for me, that a presenter being excessively funny feels annoying or gets in the wat of understanding the content. Gio.

Aug. 29, 2023

Re: The future of WineConf

by Zeb Figura

On Monday, August 21, 2023 3:41:43 PM CDT Joshua Ashton wrote: > On 8/21/23 19:30, Zeb Figura wrote: > > > On Friday, July 21, 2023 7:31:23 AM CDT Alexandre Julliard wrote: > > > >> Folks, > >> > >> > >> > >> As you may have noticed, we haven't been making any plans for WineConf > >> this year. Jeremy has been busy preparing his retirement, and I haven't > >> been pushing it either, mostly because I'm not convinced that we want to > >> continue the traditional WineConf model. > >> > >> > >> > >> Even though we skipped a few years because of the pandemic, attendance > >> at last year's WineConf wasn't great. We also suggested meeting at > >> FOSDEM in February, like we did in previous years, but essentially no > >> one showed up. > >> > >> > >> > >> So I'm wondering whether there is still enough interest for a > >> traditional WineConf, or whether we should try a different approach, to > >> maybe capture some of the recent excitement around gaming and downstream > >> uses of Wine in general. > >> > >> > >> > >> I'd like to hear your thoughts. Should we do a Proton conference, or > >> join some kind of gaming-related event? Do people even want to travel > >> to conferences anymore? What kind of event would you be interested in, > >> particularly those of you who don't show up to the traditional WineConf? > > > > > > I do have my doubts about the current formula of WineConf. I think it's > > been well-recognized by now that the most valuable thing about it is the > > parts that aren't presentations, i.e. the conversations between Wine > > developers in the hallway and at bars and so on. > > > > I suppose this is largely because Wine as a project is just too small for > > people to be unaware of what's going on. I find that most of our > > presentations are not news to me. That may be because I personally pay > > attention to what people are working on in many different parts of Wine, > > though, so maybe this isn't universal. > > > > Even if this is true more generally, though, I don't know how to resolve > > this. WineConf without the talks seems kind of silly, and I don't know > > what to replace them with. > > > > It's also true that some talks really are valuable. In the conferences > > I've been to I've quite appreciated the talks from the SFC (Karen > > Sandler in 2019, and Bradley Kuhn in 2018 and 2022), as well as the talk > > from Snorri Sturluson in 2018 (which, for reference, was basically about > > the experience of using Wine as a porting tool for a large piece of > > software). I found that these talks provided an interesting perspective > > that I am not usually exposed to. > > [Perhaps the same is true in reverse—that non-developers may appreciate > > developer presentations—but I have a hard time seeing any of these talks, > > especially my own, as particularly interesting; most of them end up being > > bland descriptions of features we have implemented.] > > > I think the problem here is more of one of the choice of topic and not > one with the conference itself. > At XDC, many of the talks were about things I didn't know about and went > into great depth of specifics of eg. a piece of hardware or software I > had never touched before. > > I think WineConf could benefit from more talks that are discussing not > "what was achieved"/news but rather how and in great depth. > > I would absolutely love to see talks from either you or Gofman, or > whoever doing deep dives into whatever crazy shit that I know nothing > about, random crazy stuff games do, ancient stuff like dshow, all the > weird red-herrings to fixing a bug. It sounds like what you're looking for is entertainment, at least primarily. And while I think there's certainly value in that, and also that an informative talk which is not engaging lacks something important, I also can't help but feel like it's not worth holding a conference for talks which for the most part aren't going to impart some valuable and useful information. I imagine that the scope of XDC is much broader, too, and so it is easier to find new information. Or, alternatively, the number of XDC contributors is much higher, so whereas one can get a pretty holistic picture of what's happening in the Wine world just from watching wine-devel, that's not possible with Mesa and all its related projects. (And, to be quite frank, I get the impression that there are many XDC presenters who are much more charismatic than I am, or experienced at making engaging presentations. It's only a vague impression, since I didn't actually attend any such XDC presentations. Regardless, there's only so much effort I can put into presenting.)

Aug. 23, 2023

Upcoming vkd3d 1.9 release

by Henri Verbeet

Hi all, The targetted release date for vkd3d 1.9 is four weeks from now, on September 20. That means the development branch will become increasingly frozen as we're nearing the release date. If you're an upstream vkd3d developer, please do the following: - Keep an eye on Bugzilla for any reported regressions. - Review any API changes since the previous release. - Verify all the vkd3d tests pass on your hardware. - Review and improve the documentation. - Apply your best judgment about which patches are appropriate for the current stage of the release process. Note that it's entirely appropriate to queue up more complicated changes for application post 1.9 and ask for review on them, but please either mark those as draft or put some kind of note in the MR description. If you're a downstream user of vkd3d, please test your applications for regressions, and file bug reports if you find any. If you're the maintainer of a Wine module that (indirectly) depends on vkd3d, like e.g. d2d1, d3dx9, d3dcompiler, or any of the core Direct3D modules, that includes making sure the unit tests still pass with the new version. We try our best to avoid regressions, but ultimately we depend on our downstream users to catch anything we may have missed before the final release. The planned release date for the release following vkd3d 1.9 is currently sometime in December. Regards, Henri

Aug. 23, 2023

Upcoming vkd3d 1.9 release

by Henri Verbeet

Hi all, The targetted release date for vkd3d 1.9 is four weeks from now, on September 20. That means the development branch will become increasingly frozen as we're nearing the release date. If you're an upstream vkd3d developer, please do the following: - Keep an eye on Bugzilla for any reported regressions. - Review any API changes since the previous release. - Verify all the vkd3d tests pass on your hardware. - Review and improve the documentation. - Apply your best judgment about which patches are appropriate for the current stage of the release process. Note that it's entirely appropriate to queue up more complicated changes for application post 1.9 and ask for review on them, but please either mark those as draft or put some kind of note in the MR description. If you're a downstream user of vkd3d, please test your applications for regressions, and file bug reports if you find any. If you're the maintainer of a Wine module that (indirectly) depends on vkd3d, like e.g. d2d1, d3dx9, d3dcompiler, or any of the core Direct3D modules, that includes making sure the unit tests still pass with the new version. We try our best to avoid regressions, but ultimately we depend on our downstream users to catch anything we may have missed before the final release. The planned release date for the release following vkd3d 1.9 is currently sometime in December. Regards, Henri

Aug. 23, 2023

Re: The future of WineConf

by Joshua Ashton

On 8/21/23 19:30, Zeb Figura wrote: > On Friday, July 21, 2023 7:31:23 AM CDT Alexandre Julliard wrote: >> Folks, >> >> As you may have noticed, we haven't been making any plans for WineConf >> this year. Jeremy has been busy preparing his retirement, and I haven't >> been pushing it either, mostly because I'm not convinced that we want to >> continue the traditional WineConf model. >> >> Even though we skipped a few years because of the pandemic, attendance >> at last year's WineConf wasn't great. We also suggested meeting at >> FOSDEM in February, like we did in previous years, but essentially no >> one showed up. >> >> So I'm wondering whether there is still enough interest for a >> traditional WineConf, or whether we should try a different approach, to >> maybe capture some of the recent excitement around gaming and downstream >> uses of Wine in general. >> >> I'd like to hear your thoughts. Should we do a Proton conference, or >> join some kind of gaming-related event? Do people even want to travel >> to conferences anymore? What kind of event would you be interested in, >> particularly those of you who don't show up to the traditional WineConf? > > I do have my doubts about the current formula of WineConf. I think it's been > well-recognized by now that the most valuable thing about it is the parts that > aren't presentations, i.e. the conversations between Wine developers in the > hallway and at bars and so on. > > I suppose this is largely because Wine as a project is just too small for > people to be unaware of what's going on. I find that most of our presentations > are not news to me. That may be because I personally pay attention to what > people are working on in many different parts of Wine, though, so maybe this > isn't universal. > > Even if this is true more generally, though, I don't know how to resolve this. > WineConf without the talks seems kind of silly, and I don't know what to > replace them with. > > It's also true that some talks really are valuable. In the conferences I've > been to I've quite appreciated the talks from the SFC (Karen Sandler in 2019, > and Bradley Kuhn in 2018 and 2022), as well as the talk from Snorri Sturluson > in 2018 (which, for reference, was basically about the experience of using > Wine as a porting tool for a large piece of software). I found that these > talks provided an interesting perspective that I am not usually exposed to. > > [Perhaps the same is true in reverse—that non-developers may appreciate > developer presentations—but I have a hard time seeing any of these talks, > especially my own, as particularly interesting; most of them end up being > bland descriptions of features we have implemented.] I think the problem here is more of one of the choice of topic and not one with the conference itself. At XDC, many of the talks were about things I didn't know about and went into great depth of specifics of eg. a piece of hardware or software I had never touched before. I think WineConf could benefit from more talks that are discussing not "what was achieved"/news but rather how and in great depth. I would absolutely love to see talks from either you or Gofman, or whoever doing deep dives into whatever crazy shit that I know nothing about, random crazy stuff games do, ancient stuff like dshow, all the weird red-herrings to fixing a bug. - Joshie 🐸✨ > > I am not sure that merging with another conference really makes sense, mostly > because I don't really see what we are trying to accomplish by doing that. The > idea seems to be "raising awareness of Wine", but to what end? > > On the other hand, if the answer is just looking for a place to have > developers meet without actually trying to hold a conference, that may make > sense. I.e. if FOSDEM were *the* yearly event for Wine developers, then I > would definitely attend, regardless of location. > > --Zeb > > > >

Aug. 21, 2023

Re: The future of WineConf

by Zeb Figura

On Friday, July 21, 2023 7:31:23 AM CDT Alexandre Julliard wrote: > Folks, > > As you may have noticed, we haven't been making any plans for WineConf > this year. Jeremy has been busy preparing his retirement, and I haven't > been pushing it either, mostly because I'm not convinced that we want to > continue the traditional WineConf model. > > Even though we skipped a few years because of the pandemic, attendance > at last year's WineConf wasn't great. We also suggested meeting at > FOSDEM in February, like we did in previous years, but essentially no > one showed up. > > So I'm wondering whether there is still enough interest for a > traditional WineConf, or whether we should try a different approach, to > maybe capture some of the recent excitement around gaming and downstream > uses of Wine in general. > > I'd like to hear your thoughts. Should we do a Proton conference, or > join some kind of gaming-related event? Do people even want to travel > to conferences anymore? What kind of event would you be interested in, > particularly those of you who don't show up to the traditional WineConf? I do have my doubts about the current formula of WineConf. I think it's been well-recognized by now that the most valuable thing about it is the parts that aren't presentations, i.e. the conversations between Wine developers in the hallway and at bars and so on. I suppose this is largely because Wine as a project is just too small for people to be unaware of what's going on. I find that most of our presentations are not news to me. That may be because I personally pay attention to what people are working on in many different parts of Wine, though, so maybe this isn't universal. Even if this is true more generally, though, I don't know how to resolve this. WineConf without the talks seems kind of silly, and I don't know what to replace them with. It's also true that some talks really are valuable. In the conferences I've been to I've quite appreciated the talks from the SFC (Karen Sandler in 2019, and Bradley Kuhn in 2018 and 2022), as well as the talk from Snorri Sturluson in 2018 (which, for reference, was basically about the experience of using Wine as a porting tool for a large piece of software). I found that these talks provided an interesting perspective that I am not usually exposed to. [Perhaps the same is true in reverse—that non-developers may appreciate developer presentations—but I have a hard time seeing any of these talks, especially my own, as particularly interesting; most of them end up being bland descriptions of features we have implemented.] I am not sure that merging with another conference really makes sense, mostly because I don't really see what we are trying to accomplish by doing that. The idea seems to be "raising awareness of Wine", but to what end? On the other hand, if the answer is just looking for a place to have developers meet without actually trying to hold a conference, that may make sense. I.e. if FOSDEM were *the* yearly event for Wine developers, then I would definitely attend, regardless of location. --Zeb

Aug. 21, 2023

Wine staging 8.14 release

by Alistair Leslie-Hughes

Binary packages for various distributions will be available from: https://www.winehq.org/download Summary since last release * Rebased to current wine 8.14 (496 patches are applied to wine vanilla) Upstreamed (Either directly from staging or fixed with a similar patch). * dmime: Store WAVE data when Loading. Added: * None Updated: * vkd3d-latest to latest. * xactengine3_7-PrepareWave * fltmgr.sys-FltBuildDefaultSecurityDescriptor * winex11-CandidateWindowPos * user32-rawinput-mouse * widl-SLTG_Typelib_Support * ntdll-Syscall_Emulation Where can you help * Run Steam/Battle.net/GOG/UPlay/Epic * Test your favorite game. * Test your favorite applications. * Improve staging patches and get them accepted upstream. * Suggest patches to be included in staging. As always, if you find a bug, please report it via https://bugs.winehq.org Best Regards Alistair.

Aug. 21, 2023

IRC-matrix bridge status?

by Jeff Smith

I became aware that I had missed a message on IRC. The sender was on matrix and I was on IRC. I haven't seen them there (#winehackers) in days. I suggested the IRC-matrix bridge was down, and was pointed to the following links, which seem likely to be relevant. (I don't know what type of bridge has been in use for this channel since the move to libera.) https://libera.chat/news/matrix-irc-bridge-updates https://libera.chat/news/matrix-bridge-disabled-retrospective Who knows what other messages may have disappeared in the ether. -- Jeff Smith

Aug. 13, 2023

Re: The future of WineConf

by Thomas Crider

Hi everyone, just throwing my two cents in here. I was invited to WineConf last year by Jeremy but was unfortunately not able to attend due to family-related conflicts. I would still very much like to attend given the dates don't conflict with current travel plans. Ubuntu Summit takes place November 3-5 this year which would be my only current restriction. I would also be interested in attending future WineConfs given the opportunity. I agree here that the pandemic really put a damper on things from 2020-2022 and would be glad to see some normalcy return. - Tom/Eggy On Tue, Aug 1, 2023 at 7:20 AM Henri Verbeet <hverbeet(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Fri, 28 Jul 2023 at 09:31, Austin English <austinenglish(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > > I've noticed that our EU conferences tend to have more people, and I > suspect that not having to deal with US visas is a factor in that. > > > > In case it helps, I'll point out that the 2019 conference in Toronto > was quite possibly the best attended WineConf in North America; > certainly in the time since I started contributing to Wine. > > >

Aug. 1, 2023

Re: The future of WineConf

by Henri Verbeet

On Fri, 28 Jul 2023 at 09:31, Austin English <austinenglish(a)gmail.com> wrote: > I've noticed that our EU conferences tend to have more people, and I suspect that not having to deal with US visas is a factor in that. > In case it helps, I'll point out that the 2019 conference in Toronto was quite possibly the best attended WineConf in North America; certainly in the time since I started contributing to Wine.

Aug. 1, 2023