On Oct 3, 2008, at 10:49 AM, David Weintraub wrote:
> Plus, you have situations where someone accidently checked in
> information that contains proprietary information that doesn't belong
> in the source repository. Removing this information is impossible with
> Subversion without a dump, filter, and load.
Yes, but that wasn't the OP's question. But for those interested in
this feature, the relevant links are
http://subversion.tigris.org/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=516
and
http://svn.collab.net/repos/svn/trunk/notes/obliterate/
>> Subversion does not distinguish between text and binary files at
>> this level;
>> it stores all files as differences. Some types of binary files can
>> be stored
>> quite efficiently this way, but others (especially some compressed
>> formats)
>> not so much.
>
> Actually, Subversion does differentiate between binaries and text
> files. It has to. Otherwise, you might end up attempting to merge
> binaries. What Subversion doesn't do is distinguish the difference
> between binaries and text files in storage. Subversion uses properties
> to say whether a file is binary or text.
Right, that's what I meant by "at this level". Subversion performs a
heuristic at "svn add" time to guess if a file is binary, and if so,
sets the svn:mime-type to "application/octet-stream". But users can
override this, and it has no bearing on how the file is stored in the
repository.
> In both Perforce and ClearCase, you could store binaries in diff
> format if you so chose to. The repository would work. Of course, you'd
> have to make sure you don't merge binaries. But, the main reason both
> of these companies chose to use a separate format for binary storage
> is space efficiency. They store binaries in compressed format and both
> claim that binary files don't store in diff format very efficiently.
>
> Subversion's decision to use the same format for binary and text came
> out of the open source environment. Disk space is cheap, so why add
> complexity to a program to save a gigabyte here or there? I actually
> agree with this sentiment, but not the IT departments I have to work
> with.
I was under the impression that Subversion stores all files
compressed in the repository, text or binary (since Subversion does
not differentiate at this level).
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscribe_at_subversion.tigris.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-help_at_subversion.tigris.org
Received on 2008-10-03 23:43:40 CEST