From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: "Stephen J. Turnbull" Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Manual policy (Re: Emacs-devel Digest, Vol 44, Issue 65) Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2007 03:09:06 +0900 Message-ID: <87odf46w8t.fsf@uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> References: <20071010211743.5104873931@grelber.thyrsus.com> <20071010214419.GA1297@thyrsus.com> <470D4D3E.3030603@gnu.org> <20071010225534.GA1955@thyrsus.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: sea.gmane.org 1192212482 7332 80.91.229.12 (12 Oct 2007 18:08:02 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2007 18:08:02 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org, Jason Rumney To: esr@thyrsus.com Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Oct 12 20:07:49 2007 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 1IgOvA-0000un-1r for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 12 Oct 2007 20:07:36 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1IgOv3-0007mZ-Rl for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 12 Oct 2007 14:07:29 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1IgOv0-0007j7-Dj for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Oct 2007 14:07:26 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1IgOuy-0007ej-7I for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Oct 2007 14:07:26 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1IgOuy-0007eU-2U for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Oct 2007 14:07:24 -0400 Original-Received: from mtps01.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp ([130.158.97.223]) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1IgOus-0002KI-9G; Fri, 12 Oct 2007 14:07:18 -0400 Original-Received: from uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (unknown [130.158.99.156]) by mtps01.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (Postfix) with ESMTP id CECAE1535A8; Sat, 13 Oct 2007 03:07:15 +0900 (JST) Original-Received: by uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (Postfix, from userid 1000) id E05DC1A2E12; Sat, 13 Oct 2007 03:09:07 +0900 (JST) In-Reply-To: <20071010225534.GA1955@thyrsus.com> X-Mailer: VM 7.17 under 21.5 (beta28) "fuki" (+CVS-20070621) XEmacs Lucid X-detected-kernel: by monty-python.gnu.org: Linux 2.6, seldom 2.4 (older, 4) 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:80736 Archived-At: Eric S. Raymond writes: > Stability is good. Signs of life and responsiveness from the dev team > are, however, just as important. I want to have reasonable confidence > that someone is alive to deal with bug reports. It's not bug reports that are the issue in a recommendation like this one; it's usability. Arch is stable, and works well as designed. The issue I think is important is that Arch pioneered the "porcelain vs. plumbing" distinction that git has so felicitously described; Arch proper is plumbing, unlike what you (incorrectly) class as "more modern" derivatives like bazaar and bzr. They're not "more modern", they're simply integrated and to some extent simplified (Tom would say "dumbed-down") porcelains. (Plumbing may be optimized, as well, which is a huge issue with darcs and something of an issue with Arch.) Arch has proved itself quite amenable to Emacs-based porcelains like xetla, while still providing the raw power of Arch itself. (Although I haven't experienced Arch as more powerful than git; I'm curious what use cases Manoj has in mind that Arch handles well while git does not.) Nonetheless, I would not recommend Arch as a distributed VC to a project looking for a VC unless the developers are experienced with and like Arch (in which case a recommendation in vc.texi is gratuitous, at least at *the* time of writing ;-). As you probably perceive, I consider the porcelain/plumbing distinction as elegant and useful, but all active VC product communities that I know well enough to consider for my own projects (bzr, hg, git, darcs) are very firmly in the "porcelain-attached" camp. I suppose that there's a reason for that; my guess is that it gives a much smoother startup, and a confused early history can cause a lot of pain later. I don't have time to review the texi in detail, but I would suggest recommending Subversion for traditional centralized organization and as a robust vehicle for timely delivery of sanctioned versioned source code, the foursome above (possibly adding Monotone about which I know nothing) for general distributed use, and mentioning the existence of GNU Arch (which after all is a GNU project and does have some special features, not to mention substantial historic interest). Then point to one or more of the excellent comparison pages out on the web, or to Wikipedia which though of uneven quality is likely to be updated reasonably often. HTH