Setting "use-commit-times" on project/directory/file basis

[Gingko <fr...@nospam.homelinux.org>]

Hello,

I know that Subversion has a configuration feature named "use-commit-times" 
that allows setting files modification dates and times to the one of their 
committed time.

But as far as I know, this kind of configuration feature works only on 
system wide basis.

I would like to know if there is a way to set the same kind of configuration 
on per project, per directory or per file basis?

I don't (and can't really) use this option because, as stated in 
http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.5/svn.advanced.confarea.html , "build 
systems often look at timestamps as a way of deciding which files need to be 
recompiled", and this is effectively the most convenient for me.

But I also have some files in my project, most of them being binary and not 
subject to compilation (for example pictures or icons), that are part of an 
auto-update process from the users point of view, and this auto-update 
process uses the file's modification date in order to decide if the file 
needs to be updated or not. Of course, these files are also included in the 
Subversion repository.

That's why it would be useful if I could have a way to keep (and share with 
other members of the project) modification dates of these file according to 
their commit times, or even better, to their original modification times 
(which would then need to be recorded).

I read somewhere (actually here : http://www.aryehleib.com/Subversion.html ) 
about an idea of adding a "svn:mtimes" property that could be set to files 
or directories in order to have Subversion recording file modification times 
(and restore them along with the corresponding files). Are there some plans 
for implementing something like that?

Best regards,

Gingko

Re: Setting "use-commit-times" on project/directory/file basis

[Andy Levy <an...@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Jul 8, 2011 at 01:56, Gingko <fr...@nospam.homelinux.org> wrote:

> I read somewhere (actually here : http://www.aryehleib.com/Subversion.html )
> about an idea of adding a "svn:mtimes" property that could be set to files
> or directories in order to have Subversion recording file modification times
> (and restore them along with the corresponding files). Are there some plans
> for implementing something like that?

That post is over 3 years old,  written by someone who is not
affiliated with the Subversion project as far as I can tell.

See http://subversion.tigris.org/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=1256 and the
most recent discussion of a design spec that I can find,
http://svn.haxx.se/dev/archive-2010-02/0127.shtml

1.7 is in the alpha release stage so this new feature, if it were to
happen, wouldn't come until 1.8 (and this is noted on the issue
tracker, as it's labeled 1.8-consider).

Re: UNS: Setting "use-commit-times" on project/directory/file basis

[Andreas Krey <a....@gmx.de>]

On Fri, 08 Jul 2011 07:56:53 +0000, Gingko wrote:
...
> But I also have some files in my project, most of them being binary and not 
> subject to compilation (for example pictures or icons), that are part of an 
> auto-update process from the users point of view, and this auto-update 
> process uses the file's modification date in order to decide if the file 
> needs to be updated or not.

This will drop on your feet as soon as you start working with multiple
branches (at least if your only look for is-newer-than-the-previous-one).

Andreas

-- 
"Totally trivial. Famous last words."
From: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@*.org>
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 2010 07:29:21 -0800