From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Checking in files with trailing white space Date: Tue, 13 Dec 2016 21:00:16 +0200 Message-ID: <8360mnbqnz.fsf@gnu.org> References: <20161211133110.GB14084@acm.fritz.box> <20161212221642.GA4361@acm.fritz.box> <83wpf4bj26.fsf@gnu.org> <366009d8-72f4-2f85-103c-214a5e111e77@cs.ucla.edu> <83oa0fbyx6.fsf@gnu.org> Reply-To: Eli Zaretskii NNTP-Posting-Host: blaine.gmane.org X-Trace: blaine.gmane.org 1481655668 19564 195.159.176.226 (13 Dec 2016 19:01:08 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@blaine.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 13 Dec 2016 19:01:08 +0000 (UTC) Cc: acm@muc.de, larsi@gnus.org, emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Paul Eggert Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Tue Dec 13 20:01:00 2016 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by blaine.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.84_2) (envelope-from ) id 1cGsJv-0003q5-LX for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Tue, 13 Dec 2016 20:00:59 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:40119 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1cGsJz-00072P-Uk for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Tue, 13 Dec 2016 14:01:03 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:49873) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1cGsJq-000728-79 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 13 Dec 2016 14:00:58 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1cGsJm-0008RQ-GJ for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 13 Dec 2016 14:00:54 -0500 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::e]:49545) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1cGsJm-0008RL-DG; Tue, 13 Dec 2016 14:00:50 -0500 Original-Received: from 84.94.185.246.cable.012.net.il ([84.94.185.246]:2741 helo=home-c4e4a596f7) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtpsa (TLS1.2:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:256) (Exim 4.82) (envelope-from ) id 1cGsJj-00011X-Cy; Tue, 13 Dec 2016 14:00:49 -0500 In-reply-to: (message from Paul Eggert on Tue, 13 Dec 2016 10:33:07 -0800) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.2.x-3.x [generic] X-Received-From: 2001:4830:134:3::e X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.21 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:210414 Archived-At: > Cc: acm@muc.de, larsi@gnus.org, emacs-devel@gnu.org > From: Paul Eggert > Date: Tue, 13 Dec 2016 10:33:07 -0800 > > > what about data files that cannot be easily produced from text on > > any garden-variety system? > > An Elisp program can easily produce data files in any format, so this > should not be a problem in practice. Producing arbitrary output from a text description might not be easy. Unless you are willing to accept ASCII-ized binary files in the form of hex dump or something. That might make some files harder to read, not easier, though. IOW, Git will be happier, but we the humans might not be. > > We don't want to make the job of adding tests any harder than it > > already is. > > We can tolerate low-quality tests, I suppose. But it's better if tests > are readable and work well with standard tools like "git diff". So we > should encourage replacing binary data with text in the repository, as > this will make the tests more maintainable. I'm okay with encouraging that, I just don't think we should require it. > This is not merely a practical point; it's also a philosophical one. The > GPL distinguishes source code from object code. Typically, binary data > files are "object code" in the GPL sense, in that they are not the > preferred form of a test case for software-development tools like Git. > Whenever we distribute object code, the GPL implies that we should also > distribute the corresponding source code that is easy for Git etc. to > work with. This source code belongs in the Git repository, and the > corresponding object code need not and should not be in the Git repository. I'm not sure this is relevant here. E.g., we distribute Emacs sources as a compressed archive, not as a set of plain-text files. So stuff like entry.strange.gz is not an issue in this respect, I think.