From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Karl Fogel Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Workflow to accumulate individual changes? Date: Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:47:44 -0500 Message-ID: <87oclfapsv.fsf@red-bean.com> References: <87637of4y8.fsf@kobe.laptop> <87oclfdzs2.fsf@kobe.laptop> <87k4w32q3g.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> Reply-To: Karl Fogel NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1262288886 14645 80.91.229.12 (31 Dec 2009 19:48:06 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 31 Dec 2009 19:48:06 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: David Kastrup Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Dec 31 20:47:57 2009 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1NQR01-0006ek-Fi for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 20:47:57 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:48880 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NQR01-0000bG-RM for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:47:57 -0500 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NQQzx-0000b3-JH for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:47:53 -0500 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NQQzs-0000ab-8a for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:47:52 -0500 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=50757 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NQQzs-0000aY-3J for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:47:48 -0500 Original-Received: from sanpietro.red-bean.com ([66.146.206.141]:39903) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1NQQzq-0003nX-7F; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:47:46 -0500 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:52128 helo=kfogel-work ident=kfogel) by sanpietro.red-bean.com with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1NQQzp-0007RE-1v; Thu, 31 Dec 2009 13:47:45 -0600 In-Reply-To: <87k4w32q3g.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> (David Kastrup's message of "Thu, 31 Dec 2009 15:08:35 +0100") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.1.91 (gnu/linux) X-detected-operating-system: by monty-python.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 3) X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:119168 Archived-At: David Kastrup writes: >_IF_ the file change history is important, we can generate it on the >source web page on the fly, from the VCS logs. ChangeLog dates from a >time of VCS-less development. If we really want to distribute this sort >of info, generating it from commits is quite more reliable. > >One point of a distributed version control system is that non-privileged >users may clone their own repository and have all this historical data >in case they need to work with it. > >My vote is for moving ChangeLog maintenance to proper commit message >maintenance: that is more important for a developer with version control >access, and again, DVCS use means that this info is available off-line >to the user/programmer. With CVS, it wasn't. > >> Maybe we can try to strike a balance between not keeping the ChangeLog >> up to date at all and making it difficult to commit *one* changeset >> that includes both ChangeLog updates _and_ file updates by committing >> the ChangeLog updates separately? > >I don't consider it useful anymore to artificially split relevant change >info between ChangeLog and commit messages: all relevant version control >tools (graphical browsers etc) access the commit messages, and those are >there also offline. > >There is no info we want in ChangeLog that should be missing from commit >messages. > >The price Emacs developers pay for following the proposed hair-splitting >policies now is too high. With CVS, off-line access to the ChangeLog >was a somewhat valid argument. With DVCS, it isn't. +1 all over this. Our commit logs should follow the same structure ChangeLog entries currently do, and we should not maintain separate ChangeLog files. There would be zero information loss; also much less confusion, and much less time wasted discussing how to maintain the same information in two places.