My favourite: One line printed per module linked into the IOC, so that you have a small table of "versions used" in the log - even when you're looking at old logs where issuing a "version" command should have been done months ago.
Well ... there's actually two things that are probably to be handled separately:
1. An ASCII splash screen
That's technically pretty useless, but a traditional and valuable marketing tool. Remember the VxWorks logo that was scrolling through when an IOC booted? You do, even after more than a decade - that's why it's valuable.
We could have a splash, based on an ASCII version of the new logo. Maybe mention the main contributing labs (like the CS-Studio splash)? 10 lines max.?
And - like in VxWorks - users should be able to opt out by setting an environment variable.
2. A condensed module version listing
Nowadays, the report() method of the device support API uses the wrong granularity - I don't want to see 25 identical lines for my Device Support just because it supports 25 record types.
Any IOC software module (including Base) should be able to set a one-line string that will be printed when a "version" command runs. For production systems useful to be run at startup to have a short list of the versions in the log file. When developing, you might care less.
Both look like pretty projects for the February codeathon.
@Timo: Do you think Dirk also does ASCII design?
Cheers,
~Ralph