Re: Subversion semantics: no no-op changes

On Fri, Oct 11, 2019 at 4:56 PM Julian Foad <julianfoad_at_apache.org> wrote:
...
> Some of the existing svn protocols and APIs explicitly preserve certain
> no-op changes. For example, one user reported [2] that in their svn
> history (converted from CVS) they would "hate to lose" the historical
> record that "svn log -v" reports "file text changed" for a certain no-op
> file change. When I eliminated this no-op change from "dump", without
> due care to backward compatibility, it was considered a regression and
> reverted [#4598]. There are valid arguments for preserving backward
> compatibility in some places. However, I propose such behaviour should
> be considered obsolete and broken, and a migration path should be
> planned to get away from it.

Hi Julian,

As the user in question, who reported this loss of history at $company
while dumping/loading our repo: at the time, I was mainly concerned
with backwards compatibility, wanting to preserve our existing history
as close to 100% as possible. I was also very much surprised by this
change in behaviour. Another couple of years have passed, and now I
think: meh, it's probably not such a big deal.

Do note however that at the time of that mail in 2015 (and issue
#4598), it was also determined that the change in behaviour in 1.9 (no
longer dumping those no-op changes) was unintentional (side effect of
another change by Stefan Fuhrmann). That's one of the reasons why it
was considered a regression.

Anyway, that's all "history" now. I just wanted to say: if y'all
decide to get rid of no-op changes, I won't oppose it at all cost for
the sake of backwards compatibility any more :-). So FWIW, consider my
opinion "neutral" on the matter.

-- 
Johan
> [2] Email: "No-op changes no longer dumped by 'svnadmin dump' in 1.9",
>      from Johan Corveleyn to dev@, 2015-09-21,
>      https://svn.haxx.se/dev/archive-2015-09/0269.shtml
>
> http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/subversion-dev/201509.mbox/%3CCAB84uBVe8QnEpbPVAb__yQjiDDoYjFn2+M9mPcdBXZCwMCpOLw@mail.gmail.com%3E
>
> [#4598] "No-op changes no longer dumped by 'svnadmin dump' in 1.9",
>      https://subversion.apache.org/issue/4598
>      https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/SVN-4598
>
> [#4623] "no-op prop change not preserved across dump/load"
>      https://subversion.apache.org/issue/4623
>      https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/SVN-4623