Ryan Schmidt wrote:
> On Feb 24, 2006, at 18:11, robert@infotility.com wrote:
>
>> Since we know already that symbolic aliases are useful
>> (HEAD, BASE, etc) why not set up a mechanism to allow
>> users to make new ones?
>>
>> Various correspondents have suggested workarounds or
>> hacks of various kinds. Thanks guys, but if there's
>> evidence that there is widespread desire for this feature
>> (namely that it has been solved multiple times by
>> multiple persons) why not just build it into the standard release?
>
>
> I for one just don't understand yet what functionality is being
> gained.
>
>
> Given a project named $P and a repository whose root is $R, and a
> standard trunk/branches/tags structure in the project, and a tag
> named $T,
>
>
> Subversion currently has:
>
> To create a new tag:
>
> svn cp $R/$P/{trunk,tags/$T} -m "Creating tag $T"
>
> To replace an existing tag:
>
> svn rm $R/$P/tags/$T -m "Removing tag $T"
> svn cp $R/$P/{trunk,tags/$T} -m "Recreating tag $T"
>
> To check out the tag:
>
> svn co $R/$P/tags/$T
>
> To get a log of the tag:
>
> svn log $R/$P/tags/$T
>
>
> What's being proposed seems to be:
>
> To create a new tag:
>
> svn alias [-r HEAD] $T $R/$P/trunk
>
> To replace an existing tag:
>
> svn alias -force [-r HEAD] $T $R/$P/trunk
>
> To check out the tag:
>
> svn co -r $T $R/$P/trunk
>
> To get a log of the tag:
>
> svn log -r $T:0 $R/$P/trunk
>
>
> Is it just this alternate syntax that's desired, or is there some
> additional functionality that's gained over Subversion's existing
> tagging method that I'm just not seeing at the moment?
I'm not viewing it as an alternate syntax for tags (though I could see
it being used as a sort of "tags lite" by those who don't like the way
subversion does tags, I think that'd be silly, as you lose a lot of
power by doing so). Currently, there are three ways of referencing
revisions in the repository--by specific number, time, or the HEAD
keyword (the other keywords don't apply to the repository, just working
copies). So, to look back at a certain revision, you either need to dig
through the logs to find its number, or try to remember what day it was
that you're interested in. Giving the users the ability to create
useful, human-readable (and rememberable) names for specific revisions
would be an enhancement.
The first use case that occurs to me is for merge tracking. Say you've
got a typical layout:
-trunk/
-tags/
-branches/
|-branch1/
|-branch2/
|...
Currently, the recommended practice is to carefully note what revisions
are being merged into the trunk in the log file of the merge, and then
when you next merge, dig through the log looking for the last merge
comment.
(http://svnbook.red-bean.com/nightly/en/svn.branchmerge.copychanges.html
) If, however, you were able to create an alias for the last merged
revision, you could do the following:
$ svn merge -r BRANCH1_LAST_MERGE:HEAD <repos>/branch1
<verify and commit>
$ svn alias -force -r HEAD BRANCH1_LAST_MERGED
As long as everyone who does merges updates the alias as well, you don't
need to dig through any logs to determine which revision to start the
merge from.
-David
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Received on Fri Feb 24 19:04:33 2006