From: Configuration Control Board

CCB Meeting 4 August 2008

Attendees

Robyn Allsman
Tim Axelrod
Roc Cutri
Robert Lupton
Russell Owen
Russell Laher

Proposals Discussed

Meeting

Code Check Software Benchmarking

Russ Laher provided status on his benchmarking of Abraxis and Parasoft Code Check software.

Abraxis

  • The full Abraxis demo was installed on an NCSA system and run in no-rule mode to ensure functionality.
  • A single license has been purchased.
  • The Abraxis support person, Patrick, said he would work with Russ in order tobuild the LSST ruleset.
    • Patrick anticipated completing 10 rules a week; those rules would be selected by Russ.
    • The first rules were provided to Patrick on July 23 but their ruleset hadn't been returned as of 4 Aug meeting. Russ received the ruleset 5 August.
  • Abraxis has 100's of rulesets on their website which implement a variety of community standards.
    • Robyn suggested that Russ review the LSST rules and the available Abraxis rulesets in order to pick out the more obvious standard constraints.
    • Russ suggested LSST might pay Patrick a nominal fee to more quickly implement the LSST ruleset.
  • There are some LSST filenaming rules which are not able to be converted into an Abraxis ruleset but which are possible using Parasoft's extended rule analysis supporting locally developed python functions.
  • Abraxis is simple to use
    • it runs from the command line;
    • can easily write local script to run the tool over the entire software set.

Parasoft

  • Price of Parasoft product is $18K for a Server license; Parasoft has agreed to help configure the rules if LSST purchases the Server edition.
  • The product provides:
    • rule checking
      • those rules are defined via a graphical rule wizard which seemed as though it would be easy to use
      • specialized checking is possible using locally developed python functions. The Parasoft demo includes such a sample.
    • automatic unit testing -
      • utility to LSST still needs to be explored
      • allows client specific units tests in addition to automatically generatedunit tests
    • regression analysis - utility to LSST still needs to be explored
    • coverage analysis - utility to LSST still needs to be explored
  • The product can be initiated either through a graphical user interface or the command line.
  • Issue: prior to the first Parasoft run, a 'project' needs to be setup. The procedure appears straightforward but has not yet been tested.
  • An additional product (Ensure++) provides lint/purify-like runtime analysis for unitialized variables, unreferenced pointers, error bounds checking, etc. This product hasn't been tested yet.

Russ will continue to benchmark both products for suitability within the LSST build framework. Russ is arranging for Parasoft to demo their product at the August 21 Application's meeting at IPAC.

Image Metadata Proposal

Russell Owen's proposal defines a new implementation for the construct and location of image metadata in order to remove duplication of metadata across related images. The summary of a discussion of the proposal at the July 21 Applications Meeting was added to the proposal document as was a later pro/con email thread.

The spirited discussion was focussed on Tim Axelrod's opinion that the proposed implementation wouldn't work in the general case. He reiterated his email which presented a common situation which wouldn't be served. Robert agreed that Tim's example wouldn't be covered.

Tim wants the Proposal to be made more concrete by defining the header files needed by the implementation. He feels the exercise will expose any deficiencies in the proposed implementation so they can be addressed.

Russell agreed to create the header definitions and add them to the Proposal's twiki page for group review.

Action Items

  • Russ Laher will continue his code checker benchmarking.
  • Russell Owen will update the Image Metadata proposal to include the proposed header definitions for affected image types.
  • Robert Lupton's second iteration on the Pixel Addressing Proposal is held over for CCB review until next meeting.
  • Robert needs to provide a reprise of the Build Package Proposal ... especially since its implementation is well underway.
  • Robert is preparing the DM Policy on iterators.
  • [Aside: Robert also mentioned he still needs to implement a wrapper making VW invisible to application code. The CCB approved this change 7 May 08.]