Version checking problem during firmware build

melanieAQ

I created a git sandbox like this for the purposes of flashing the Sinara system, and created a nix development shell using the procedure from the manual.
git clone https://github.com/m-labs/artiq.git ; cd artiq ; git checkout f49f1fcb

Then I executed this step to build the firmware
python -m artiq.gateware.targets.kasli_generic ~/aq.json

However, that failed with a version check. What's the best way to solve this problem? If I delete the version check, then I can complete the firmware build, and flash the system and it all works fine, but I'd like to know if there's a better way. Thanks a lot. Here's the traceback:

File "/home/sinara/_melanie/sandbox/clone1/artiq/artiq/gateware/targets/kasli_generic.py", line 174, in <module>
    main()
  File "/home/sinara/_melanie/sandbox/clone1/artiq/artiq/gateware/targets/kasli_generic.py", line 152, in main
    if LooseVersion(artiq_version) < LooseVersion(min_artiq_version):
  File "/nix/store/5f36vg11fdfl6x6sva70cb0jqf722qqn-python3-3.8.11/lib/python3.8/distutils/version.py", line 52, in __lt__
    c = self._cmp(other)
  File "/nix/store/5f36vg11fdfl6x6sva70cb0jqf722qqn-python3-3.8.11/lib/python3.8/distutils/version.py", line 337, in _cmp
    if self.version < other.version:
TypeError: '<' not supported between instances of 'str' and 'int'

melanieAQ

PS I think the comparison in kasli_generic.py is occurring between "6.unknown" and 6.0, i.e. string comparison to numeric

sb10q

There have been some backward-incompatible changes in the Python API that are causing this problem, you can use older nixpkgs, or delete/upgrade the version check code as you did.