Re: Merge of deleted file with a modified one

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to me this issue is really
simple.

A conflict occurs whenever two file have changed from their common
origin into different directions, and the changes overlap so a simple
merge of the changes is not obvious.

In such a case, the situation is called a conflict in order to force
human intervention and ensure that no loss of data can take place.

I think this logically leads to the following design principle for
source control systems:

- If there is a merge situation where one could argue that either of
  two outcomes are reasonable, and one of those outcomes results in
  the loss of data that the advocate of the other outcome wanted
  to preserve, then you MUST treat such a situation as a conflict
  and you MUST NOT automatically pick the choice that (for some users)
  causes them to lose data they wanted.

  And no, "review the merge output" is NOT a valid answer in this sort
  of case.

     paul

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscribe@subversion.tigris.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-help@subversion.tigris.org
Received on Tue Jan 10 02:23:43 2006