ABI/API Compliance Checker in github workflow

tomoyafujita · June 8, 2024, 7:44pm

Hi ROS users and developers,

i would like to open discussion and have feedback from community.

ABI/API Compliance Checker in github workflow

opened 05:08PM - 08 Jun 24 UTC

## Feature request #### Feature description Integrate ABI/API compliance c…hecker in github workflow to check ABI compatibility for every PR to see if the fix can be backported automatically with label. #### Background Currently, for every PR, we (developers and maintainers) check the ABI compatibility if the PR is backportable to already available distribution. Sometimes it could be hard to tell with looking at the source code for sure, this also depends on the developers's skill and experience. (I personally run ABI compliance checker to make sure for this.) Basically all bug fixes should be backported to the downstream distribution, but sometimes we miss and do that `need-to-do` or `requested` basis. (we can find comments requesting or asking for the backport to released distribution.) To avoid this burden for developers and maintainers and keep the high quality for ROS distribution, it would be nice to have ABI compliance checker automatically run against the PR, so that we will be able to know the fix is ABI compatible with the tag or label provided by the workflow. ### Note This `ABI Compatible` or `Backport-able` tag is an additional information for maintainers, says this does not mean we have to backport the fix to already released distros. Although ABI is compatible, different behavior or significant different user-experience should be avoided breaking the user space. #### Implementation considerations - we can integrate https://github.com/lvc/abi-compliance-checker to github workflow. (or any other tools or recommendation?) - build target branch and PR branch or repo to check the ABI compatibility for every commits. - new label `ABI compatible` needs to be introduced and tagged by workflow. I am creating this issue on rclcpp (because that is where i can find this situation most.) but the following core repositories can have the same ABI checker CI. - https://github.com/ros2/rcl.git - https://github.com/ros2/rcl_logging.git - https://github.com/ros2/rcpputils.git - https://github.com/ros2/rcutils.git - https://github.com/ros2/rmw.git - https://github.com/ros2/rmw_connextdds.git - https://github.com/ros2/rmw_cyclonedds.git - https://github.com/ros2/rmw_dds_common.git - https://github.com/ros2/rmw_fastrtps.git - https://github.com/ros2/rmw_implementation.git - https://github.com/ros2/rosbag2.git ```mermaid flowchart TD A[PR / Every Commit] -->|workflow| B[ABI Compliance Check] B --> C{ABI Compatible?} C -->|Yes| D[Tag / Label] D --> E[Code Review] C -->|No / Not Required| E[Code Review / Approval] C -->|ABI Compatible Required?| A[PR / Every Commit] E -->|Mergifyio| F[Backport Process] ``` after all, i think this will do some good for ROS users, developers and maintainers to accelerate the development process and ROS quality. Tomoya,

Problem

Development and Operation Burden: maintainer and developer burden to check ABI compatibility for backport.
Quality: we sometimes miss backporting for released distribution unless requested. (bug fixes basically should be backported to available distribution to keep the consistent quality for all supported distribution.)

Proposal

Integrate ABI/API compliance checker in github workflow to check ABI compatibility for every PR to see if the fix can be backported automatically with label.

What’s in it for us?

User: Quality Improvement, potentially all bug fixes that ABI compatible with can backport to already released distribution.
Developer/Maintainer: Cost Effective, automatically determine if the fix is backport-able for already released distribution. (automatically labeled.)

Comments and feedbacks are welcome!!! Please share your thoughts!

Best,
Tomoya

Bernd_Pfrommer · June 8, 2024, 9:18pm

Great idea! I have always wondered how to check ABI compatibility so if somebody can produce an example package that demonstrates how to incorporate this into a ROS2/cmake workflow, that would be awesome. I’d definitely use it.

Is this going to be just for rclcpp for now, or are you planning on making this accessible to all ros packages, maybe by providing an ABI check via action-ros-ci?

fmauch · June 10, 2024, 6:59am

industrual_ci offers ABI checks as used e.g. by ros2_control.

tomoyafujita · June 10, 2024, 4:54pm

I was originally thinking that rclcpp for 1st trial, but that would be better if they can accept this kind of feature.

industrual_ci offers ABI checks as used e.g. by ros2_control .

@fmauch i was hoping this kind of feature is already available somewhere! thanks! i am not sure if we can just rely on this CI with github workflow, but definitely look into this.

smac · June 10, 2024, 4:54pm

I’d love a github action for this - it would take out some of the ambiguity when I’m doing backports for syncing to released distributions in Nav2. Even if it just tags which could be backported, that would be a big acceleration in the release process. If it automatically triggered the backports for distributions that it was API/ABI compatible for, that would be even greater!

The only thing that wouldn’t immediately solve is what happens when a PR itself isn’t ABI/API breaking, but depends on previous work that was and thus not backported. I assume the crazy merge conflicts would make that clear in the ensuing PR - but if it could detect that as well (depends on a change from main that wasn’t backportable), that would let us basically completely automate the main → humble, iron, jazzy syncs in big projects like Nav2! But that’s probably out of scope, just something that I run into as well when I’m backporting for release syncs.

Bonggyu_Choi · June 11, 2024, 2:24am

ABI/API compliance checker is required for us indeed.

That’s a good idea!

system · September 9, 2024, 2:24am

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ABI/API Compliance Checker in github workflow

Problem

Proposal

What’s in it for us?

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