On Mon, Jul 25, 2011 at 10:49 AM, Les Mikesell <lesmikesell_at_gmail.com>wrote:
> On 7/25/2011 9:24 AM, Mark Phippard wrote:
>
>>
>> In SVN 1.6 and earlier it is not like someone wrote code specifically to
>> allow people to copy/move folders out of their WC. It was just
>> something that fell out of the design.
>>
>
> Agreed, but it is a logical design that falls out of the way subdirectories
> work and the way people use them.
>
>
> There are plenty of instances
>> where people did not want this behavior, and for them it is now fixed.
>>
>
> Agreed again. Although the change I would have preferred would have been
> an option to not keep a pristine copy at all for the circumstances where it
> doesn't work out well.
You agree but you are also missing or glossing over my point. When you
copied that subdirectory you were not using a feature of SVN, you used the
OS. SVN cannot provide an option on the OS copy command. So there is no
way a user could copy a folder using the OS and not copy the .svn folder.
My point was simply that SVN prior to 1.7 does not have a command for doing
what you are doing. It just fell out of how the underlying OS worked. That
is largely why SVN 1.7 still does not have such a command. It is something
new that someone has to create and figure out how it should work etc. and no
one stepped up to do it. If users really want it, someone will step up and
do it.
>> The opinion was that if users really want to be able to easily detach
>> folders from their working copy someone will step up with scripts and/or
>> patches to add a feature to SVN to do it.
>>
>
> I'm not arguing that the change is bad or shouldn't have been done, just
> that it is a very surprising change in design philosophy, and projects that
> make surprising design changes without concern for existing use patterns
> make me nervous about what other surprises may be lurking in them.
>
Given how closely you follow the project, I am surprised you are surprised.
This release has taken over 2 years and the new WC design has not changed
from the original proposal. If you go back to the lists you will see the
ramifications of this change were being discussed even while we were still
working on SVN 1.6 and the need for an svn detach was raised back then. The
bottom line is that this has been a long release cycle and the software is
now good enough to use and benefit from. There is no reason to hold it
back. If being able to copy subdirectories is important than stick with 1.6
or help to drive the effort to get scripts or patches submitted so that the
feature can make it into 1.8. If it is done with scripts, it can be
delivered immediately.
--
Thanks
Mark Phippard
http://markphip.blogspot.com/
Received on 2011-07-25 16:59:02 CEST