> I used to think I liked the idea of revision labels. I don't anymore.
> What I just realized is this: revision labels really aren't enough. A
> revision number only specifies the y-coordinate. It wouldn't be useful
> (for me at least, my repository root isn't my trunk). Besides, as I use
> svn more and more, I have url-related frustration less and less. It's
> just not that bad (but I never used CVS).
One common "3-D" view of version repository is the "elements x revisions
x variants" model (which I first recall reading about in the I-SCM2
proceedings by Lars Bendix, Vincenzo Ambriola: "Object-Oriented
Configuration Control")
Basically they break it down into three dimensions:
* elements: the set of things being versioned (files, or objects or
logical record)
* variant: a particular long-lived variation or "flavor" (e.g., for as
platform, or a market-line)
* revision: what most of us think of when we see the term revision
This defined a 3D space. If I chose revision X.Y of ALL elements for ALL
variants, I got one set of things. Usually I need to specify something
concrete for all three (file-set, variant-name, revno) to get a
"consistent configuration"
What I beleive is being mentioned above is that SVN revision numbers
assume the applicable "collection" is the entire repository, when in
fact many want to have some rev-numbers apply only to some subset
(usually rooted at some directory somewhere on the directory-tree)
For SVN, a branch-name could "naturally" correspond to a variant, a
directory could correspond to a "collection", and the revnum could
correspond to the directory (or course that wouldnt allow me to include
versions of files from different branches in the same "named
configuration" but then again I may not need that for SVN).
I suspect folks would still want the "mnemonic" to correspond to the
revision-number (at least by default). If there were a way to either
restrict it to a subtree of the repo, or else qualify it by a specific
directory (which I think a URL would be a natural fit for) then I think
that would do the trick.
So given that, I think the mnemonic revname is still useful, and I can
qualify/restrict by giving a directory.
--
Brad Appleton <brad@bradapp.net> www.bradapp.net
Software CM Patterns (www.scmpatterns.com)
Effective Teamwork, Practical Integration
"And miles to go before I sleep" --Robert Frost
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Received on Fri May 6 08:34:21 2005