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Posted to dev@subversion.apache.org by Daniel Stenberg <da...@haxx.se> on 2001/02/22 08:26:05 UTC
Luke takes a dive into CVS
Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton of Samba fame describes one of those messy steps
he did in the Samba project to play with CVS and simultanoues development in
two branches (on advogato):
http://advogato.org/article/247.html
Keeping an eye on cvs and cvs work-arounds gives you perspective! ;-)
--
Daniel Stenberg - http://daniel.haxx.se - +46-705-44 31 77
ech`echo xiun|tr nu oc|sed 'sx\([sx]\)\([xoi]\)xo un\2\1 is xg'`ol
Web Profile (was Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS)
Posted by Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net>.
On Mon, Feb 26, 2001 at 04:39:56PM -0500, Deven T. Corzine wrote:
> There's such a thing as maintain too low of a profile, too.
>
> A stampede of interested onlookers could cause trouble, but those with a
> casual interest will drift away again when they realize it's not ready yet.
> Sufficiently-interested people will make an extra effort to get involved in
> the project and help out. But what about the middle ground in between?
>
> My feeling is that there is a not-insignificant segment of the developer
> population that might take an interest in furthering the project, but maybe
> not so much of an interest that they'll go far out of their way. Lowering
> the barrier to entry is the best way to turn such potential developers into
> active participants in the program. Making it easy to keep up with the
> status and ongoing efforts helps to lower that barrier.
>
> Perhaps it's best to start this kind of thing early, usable or not?
>
> Deven
I tend to agree with you Deven. Do you have any ideas for how to go
about keeping Subversion's web site a little more dynamic? Do you want
try making some changes to it? If you are interested, you can either
send some patches to the list, or to me personally if people want to
keep significant web related patches of the list. On another note, I
think it would be nice to fix the site so that it is compliant with an
HTML spec. Taking a look at
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://subversion.tigris.org shows
that we have a ways to go. I was going to do a bit, but it is sort of a
pain, since I don't have the entire tigris framework, so I would have to
check in a zillion little patches to test and get things working.
Anyone have a better way to go about it?
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Kevin Pilch-Bisson http://www.pilch-bisson.net
"Historically speaking, the presences of wheels in Unix
has never precluded their reinvention." - Larry Wall
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by "Deven T. Corzine" <de...@ties.org>.
There's such a thing as maintain too low of a profile, too.
A stampede of interested onlookers could cause trouble, but those with a
casual interest will drift away again when they realize it's not ready yet.
Sufficiently-interested people will make an extra effort to get involved in
the project and help out. But what about the middle ground in between?
My feeling is that there is a not-insignificant segment of the developer
population that might take an interest in furthering the project, but maybe
not so much of an interest that they'll go far out of their way. Lowering
the barrier to entry is the best way to turn such potential developers into
active participants in the program. Making it easy to keep up with the
status and ongoing efforts helps to lower that barrier.
Perhaps it's best to start this kind of thing early, usable or not?
Deven
On Thu, 22 Feb 2001, Greg Stein wrote:
> This is a definite point for a "public / usable" project. We aren't at that
> stage, so there is actually something to be said for not drowning in
> inquiries from stampedes of interested onlookers. Maintaining a low profile,
> until you're ready, has a few advantages.
>
> :-)
>
> Cheers,
> -g
>
> On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 12:04:52PM -0500, Deven T. Corzine wrote:
> >
> > On 22 Feb 2001 Kevin Pilch-Bisson wrote:
> >
> > > In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> > > I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> > > think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> > > the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> > > are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> > > mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> > > status updates.
> > >
> > > What do you all think?
> >
> > I think this is a VERY good idea. In fact, I think it's a big mistake that
> > many projects make, leaving users with a casual interest no way to easily
> > find news tidbits and status information. For example, this was a problem
> > with the Mozilla project for a long time -- the active developers knew that
> > the project was VERY busy, but if you weren't on the mailing lists or IRC
> > (especially IRC!), you were relying on the website for information and it
> > looked like the project was languishing when it was in fact very active.
> >
> > Having a weekly status report (news, task status, bug & fixes, etc.) can
> > really help a lot. Summarizing significant threads from the mailing list
> > (a la kernel-traffic) is also valuable for people without time to track the
> > mailing lists personally. Having this information appear on a near-daily
> > basis is ideal, but weekly is probably sufficient.
> >
> > Allowing the website to remain static for week after week is best avoided;
> > it conveys an impression of stagnation and inactivity, and discourages
> > people from returning often and maintaining an active level of interest in
> > the project. If there's usually something new and interesting on the site
> > (ideally daily, but at least weekly), it will encourage people to make it a
> > habit to visit the site, which will keep the project more at the forefront
> > of their minds and make it more likely they'll make the extra effort of
> > actually contributing in some fashion. It lowers the barrier to entry,
> > which is good for everyone...
> >
> > But hey, this is just my opinion. I'm new here, ignore me. :-)
> >
> > Deven
>
> --
> Greg Stein, http://www.lyra.org/
>
>
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Greg Stein <gs...@lyra.org>.
This is a definite point for a "public / usable" project. We aren't at that
stage, so there is actually something to be said for not drowning in
inquiries from stampedes of interested onlookers. Maintaining a low profile,
until you're ready, has a few advantages.
:-)
Cheers,
-g
On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 12:04:52PM -0500, Deven T. Corzine wrote:
>
> On 22 Feb 2001 Kevin Pilch-Bisson wrote:
>
> > In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> > I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> > think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> > the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> > are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> > mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> > status updates.
> >
> > What do you all think?
>
> I think this is a VERY good idea. In fact, I think it's a big mistake that
> many projects make, leaving users with a casual interest no way to easily
> find news tidbits and status information. For example, this was a problem
> with the Mozilla project for a long time -- the active developers knew that
> the project was VERY busy, but if you weren't on the mailing lists or IRC
> (especially IRC!), you were relying on the website for information and it
> looked like the project was languishing when it was in fact very active.
>
> Having a weekly status report (news, task status, bug & fixes, etc.) can
> really help a lot. Summarizing significant threads from the mailing list
> (a la kernel-traffic) is also valuable for people without time to track the
> mailing lists personally. Having this information appear on a near-daily
> basis is ideal, but weekly is probably sufficient.
>
> Allowing the website to remain static for week after week is best avoided;
> it conveys an impression of stagnation and inactivity, and discourages
> people from returning often and maintaining an active level of interest in
> the project. If there's usually something new and interesting on the site
> (ideally daily, but at least weekly), it will encourage people to make it a
> habit to visit the site, which will keep the project more at the forefront
> of their minds and make it more likely they'll make the extra effort of
> actually contributing in some fashion. It lowers the barrier to entry,
> which is good for everyone...
>
> But hey, this is just my opinion. I'm new here, ignore me. :-)
>
> Deven
--
Greg Stein, http://www.lyra.org/
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Jim Blandy <ji...@zwingli.cygnus.com>.
Sam TH <sa...@uchicago.edu> writes:
> You want to do some radical development changes on a small portion of
> the tree. But you don't want the rest of the tree to fall behind the
> mainline. So you have <files-to-be-frantically-hacked> from the
> branch in CVS, and <other-people's-problem> from CVS HEAD. =20
This sounds like what Karl described as his normal branching procedure
in CVS.
I think the way the rest of the system stays up-to-date is great.
That's a definite feature. However, when I was teaching CVS classes,
I found people had a hard time understanding the mechanics of sticky
tags, and I know people leave sticky tags on files by accident (with
highly confusing, then annoying, results).
The problem with this is that it's not generally possible to recreate
your source tree later, because you have no record of where the
mainline was when you were doing your branches. That's why we don't
do it at Red Hat Engineering Services.
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Sam TH <sa...@uchicago.edu>.
On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 10:10:56AM -0600, cmpilato@collab.net wrote:
> Jim Blandy <ji...@zwingli.cygnus.com> writes:
>
> > I'm not sure I really understand the technique he's suggesting.
>
> I'm not totally sure either, but it looks as if the end result is a
> single working copy with some files saying that their ancestry lies in
> the main tree, and some claiming heritage in a branch of that tree.
> Those in the branch are the works in progress (an API rewrite, as the
> example goes). I'm not sure if I grasp the article-inspiring
> brilliance in all of this, though.
I think the idea went something like this:
You want to do some radical development changes on a small portion of
the tree. But you don't want the rest of the tree to fall behind the
mainline. So you have <files-to-be-frantically-hacked> from the
branch in CVS, and <other-people's-problem> from CVS HEAD.
This can of course be done manually, by applying all the changes made
to head to the branch. Or probably with lots of scary merging. But
Luke's solution is O(1), so to speak.
This is actually a use-cse that I think subversion could support in a
more elegant way. Lots of branches are created in repositories for
radical development on one part of the repository. However, it
doesn't make any sense for the changes on the trunk not to be merged
in (it's not like it will become more unstable, or something). And
doing this merging each time will make the final merge, once
cool-new-feature is done, significantly easier.
So maybe there could be an option to svn branch like this:
$ svn branch --keep-this-up-to-date-with-the-mainline foo foo-branch
This would reduce the need for workarounds like Luke developed.
sam th
sam@uchicago.edu
http://www.abisource.com/~sam/
GnuPG Key:
http://www.abisource.com/~sam/key
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by "Deven T. Corzine" <de...@ties.org>.
On 22 Feb 2001 Kevin Pilch-Bisson wrote:
> In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> status updates.
>
> What do you all think?
I think this is a VERY good idea. In fact, I think it's a big mistake that
many projects make, leaving users with a casual interest no way to easily
find news tidbits and status information. For example, this was a problem
with the Mozilla project for a long time -- the active developers knew that
the project was VERY busy, but if you weren't on the mailing lists or IRC
(especially IRC!), you were relying on the website for information and it
looked like the project was languishing when it was in fact very active.
Having a weekly status report (news, task status, bug & fixes, etc.) can
really help a lot. Summarizing significant threads from the mailing list
(a la kernel-traffic) is also valuable for people without time to track the
mailing lists personally. Having this information appear on a near-daily
basis is ideal, but weekly is probably sufficient.
Allowing the website to remain static for week after week is best avoided;
it conveys an impression of stagnation and inactivity, and discourages
people from returning often and maintaining an active level of interest in
the project. If there's usually something new and interesting on the site
(ideally daily, but at least weekly), it will encourage people to make it a
habit to visit the site, which will keep the project more at the forefront
of their minds and make it more likely they'll make the extra effort of
actually contributing in some fashion. It lowers the barrier to entry,
which is good for everyone...
But hey, this is just my opinion. I'm new here, ignore me. :-)
Deven
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by cm...@collab.net.
Jim Blandy <ji...@zwingli.cygnus.com> writes:
> I'm not sure I really understand the technique he's suggesting.
I'm not totally sure either, but it looks as if the end result is a
single working copy with some files saying that their ancestry lies in
the main tree, and some claiming heritage in a branch of that tree.
Those in the branch are the works in progress (an API rewrite, as the
example goes). I'm not sure if I grasp the article-inspiring
brilliance in all of this, though.
*shrug*
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Jim Blandy <ji...@zwingli.cygnus.com>.
Daniel Stenberg <da...@haxx.se> writes:
> Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton of Samba fame describes one of those messy steps
> he did in the Samba project to play with CVS and simultanoues development in
> two branches (on advogato):
>
> http://advogato.org/article/247.html
>
> Keeping an eye on cvs and cvs work-arounds gives you perspective! ;-)
I'm not sure I really understand the technique he's suggesting.
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Alan Shutko <at...@acm.org>.
Ben Collins-Sussman <su...@newton.ch.collab.net> writes:
> That said, what sort of info could be posted?
Something like a breakdown of major components and a rough status on
each? Something like
Repository: Major hacking
Client: Kind of there, on hold pending repository
CVS Conversion script....
(Note that I'm just watching this list, not the code, and the above is
really made up.)
--
Alan Shutko <at...@acm.org> - In a variety of flavors!
Do unto others before they undo you.
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net>.
On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 10:25:38AM -0600, Ben Collins-Sussman wrote:
> Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net> writes:
>
> > In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> > I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> > think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> > the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> > are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> > mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> > status updates.
>
> The entire Tigris site is about to be upgraded to the newest version
> of Sourcecast, sometime over the next few weeks. You won't believe
> the difference. :)
I'll look forward to seeing it then!
>
> That said, what sort of info could be posted? The dev and cvs-commit
> lists detail exactly what people are thinking and doing each day. But
> we can't put these sort of details on the web page... only broad
> goals, I think.
>
I agree that that would be too much detail, but maybe give a small
snapshot, or something like a list of files modified in the last 24 hrs
or someething, just so that people see that there is stuff going on, and
in what general area. Also, as you were saying, a general outline is
nice.
I just get the impression that many people look at the site, and have no
idea what the status is, or how close it is to being usable. Then they
come back in a while, and hardly notice any difference. I'm mostly
thinking along the lines of something that says, we're here, and we are
actually working on this project.
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Kevin Pilch-Bisson http://www.pilch-bisson.net
"Historically speaking, the presences of wheels in Unix
has never precluded their reinvention." - Larry Wall
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Ben Collins-Sussman <su...@newton.ch.collab.net>.
Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net> writes:
> In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> status updates.
The entire Tigris site is about to be upgraded to the newest version
of Sourcecast, sometime over the next few weeks. You won't believe
the difference. :)
That said, what sort of info could be posted? The dev and cvs-commit
lists detail exactly what people are thinking and doing each day. But
we can't put these sort of details on the web page... only broad
goals, I think.
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Karl Fogel <kf...@galois.collab.net>.
Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net> writes:
> Let me think about it for a couple of days. I'll try to do something
> tomorrow, but I can't commit just yet. I'd also like to see this new
> version of sourcecast the Ben was mentioning. =20
Sure, whenever you're ready.
(By the way, I also want to see the sourcecast upgrade, but don't
think it is related to the timing of these status updates. The
updates are content made 100% by a human, they're not going to be
helped much by this upgrade.)
> All in all, web authoring isn't my favourite thing to do (just look at
> my website), but I can be convinced, if it isn't going to take up too
> much of my time.
That was my feeling too. :-)
-K
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Ben Collins-Sussman <su...@newton.ch.collab.net>.
Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net> writes:
> Let me think about it for a couple of days. I'll try to do something
> tomorrow, but I can't commit just yet. I'd also like to see this new
> version of sourcecast the Ben was mentioning.
Sourcecast will make the site look less "dead", and show nifty
automated statistics like "most active thread of the week" and amounts
of code flux in each module. But that's it.
> All in all, web authoring isn't my favourite thing to do [...]
BUT... this isn't about web authoring at all. It's about a human
being sitting down once per week and writing a two-paragraph summary
of what coding is happening, and what the latest topics of discussion
are.
The front page of subversion can simply link to the latest summary.
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net>.
On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 08:44:37AM -0600, Karl Fogel wrote:
> Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net> writes:
> > In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> > I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> > think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> > the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> > are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> > mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> > status updates.
> >
> > What do you all think?
>
> I think that's great. I also know that I'm going to forget to do
> it. :-)
>
> Would you like to volunteer? (Not being facetious -- it's a serious
> question, and it would be great if you can do it.)
>
Let me think about it for a couple of days. I'll try to do something
tomorrow, but I can't commit just yet. I'd also like to see this new
version of sourcecast the Ben was mentioning.
All in all, web authoring isn't my favourite thing to do (just look at
my website), but I can be convinced, if it isn't going to take up too
much of my time.
> -K
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Kevin Pilch-Bisson http://www.pilch-bisson.net
"Historically speaking, the presences of wheels in Unix
has never precluded their reinvention." - Larry Wall
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Karl Fogel <kf...@galois.collab.net>.
Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net> writes:
> In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
> I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
> think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
> the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
> are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
> mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
> status updates.
>
> What do you all think?
I think that's great. I also know that I'm going to forget to do
it. :-)
Would you like to volunteer? (Not being facetious -- it's a serious
question, and it would be great if you can do it.)
-K
> On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 09:26:05AM +0100, Daniel Stenberg wrote:
> > Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton of Samba fame describes one of those messy s=
> teps
> > he did in the Samba project to play with CVS and simultanoues development=
> in
> > two branches (on advogato):
> >=20
> > http://advogato.org/article/247.html
> >=20
> > Keeping an eye on cvs and cvs work-arounds gives you perspective! ;-)
> >=20
> > --=20
> > Daniel Stenberg - http://daniel.haxx.se - +46-705-44 31 77
> > ech`echo xiun|tr nu oc|sed 'sx\([sx]\)\([xoi]\)xo un\2\1 is xg'`ol
> >=20
> --=20
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Kevin Pilch-Bisson http://www.pilch-bisson.net
> "Historically speaking, the presences of wheels in Unix
> has never precluded their reinvention." - Larry Wall
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
> --YZ5djTAD1cGYuMQK
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Re: Luke takes a dive into CVS
Posted by Kevin Pilch-Bisson <ke...@pilch-bisson.net>.
In light of some of the comments given on page talking about subversion,
I would like to make a suggestion regarding the subversion website. I
think it would be good to move the status section closer to the top of
the page, and try to update it at least once a week. I think that there
are a lot of people watching the subversion pages, without being on the
mailing lists, and it would be nice to give them frequent accurate
status updates.
What do you all think?
On Thu, Feb 22, 2001 at 09:26:05AM +0100, Daniel Stenberg wrote:
> Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton of Samba fame describes one of those messy steps
> he did in the Samba project to play with CVS and simultanoues development in
> two branches (on advogato):
>
> http://advogato.org/article/247.html
>
> Keeping an eye on cvs and cvs work-arounds gives you perspective! ;-)
>
> --
> Daniel Stenberg - http://daniel.haxx.se - +46-705-44 31 77
> ech`echo xiun|tr nu oc|sed 'sx\([sx]\)\([xoi]\)xo un\2\1 is xg'`ol
>
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Kevin Pilch-Bisson http://www.pilch-bisson.net
"Historically speaking, the presences of wheels in Unix
has never precluded their reinvention." - Larry Wall
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~