From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Robert Thorpe Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: removing white space highlight Date: Mon, 29 Feb 2016 02:43:14 +0000 Message-ID: <87k2louth9.fsf@robertthorpeconsulting.com> References: <871t7wnxs4.fsf@debian.uxu> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1456713828 8180 80.91.229.3 (29 Feb 2016 02:43:48 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 29 Feb 2016 02:43:48 +0000 (UTC) Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org To: Emanuel Berg Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Mon Feb 29 03:43:37 2016 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1aaDo9-0004XX-0x for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Mon, 29 Feb 2016 03:43:37 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:33621 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1aaDo5-0005ry-4f for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Sun, 28 Feb 2016 21:43:33 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:34756) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1aaDnu-0005ro-83 for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Feb 2016 21:43:23 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1aaDnp-0000ik-7i for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Feb 2016 21:43:22 -0500 Original-Received: from outbound-smtp10.blacknight.com ([46.22.139.15]:37714) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1aaDnp-0000gy-1B for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Feb 2016 21:43:17 -0500 Original-Received: from mail.blacknight.com (pemlinmail06.blacknight.ie [81.17.255.152]) by outbound-smtp10.blacknight.com (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 601321C1797 for ; Mon, 29 Feb 2016 02:43:15 +0000 (GMT) Original-Received: (qmail 8372 invoked from network); 29 Feb 2016 02:43:15 -0000 Original-Received: from unknown (HELO RTLaptop) (rt@robertthorpeconsulting.com@[93.107.80.235]) by 81.17.254.9 with ESMTPSA (DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA encrypted, authenticated); 29 Feb 2016 02:43:15 -0000 In-Reply-To: <871t7wnxs4.fsf@debian.uxu> (message from Emanuel Berg on Mon, 29 Feb 2016 01:52:11 +0100) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.2.x-3.x [generic] X-Received-From: 46.22.139.15 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:109365 Archived-At: Emanuel Berg writes: > Robert Thorpe writes: > >> Every line that has whitespace removed is flagged as >> modified. It's added to the repository with my name, >> date and a new revision number. So, the problem I've >> described still occurs. > > The improvement is that the code gets cleaned up. > Which has to be done once, then invisible-to-everyone > automatization makes sure no more trailing whitespace > can ever be added. We all agree about the improvement. The problem is making it happen without destroying the power of version control. > This is completely free of charge with no penalty to > it whatsoever. How do you remove the penalty then? How do you make blame/annotate and similar tools work properly despite the changes in whitespace? Are you arguing that annotate and diffs with previous version don't matter? > Before anything enters there, cleaning is > automatically done, but not logged (well, not logged > as normal edits are anyway) Most VC systems don't support that. The only way you can do that is by either: * Writing a feature into the version control program itself. * Writing a program that understands the file format that the VC repository is in. Neither path is easy. Version control programs are long and complex. Many are longer than 50000 lines. The file formats they use for the repository are complex too and very difficult to reverse engineer. I know because I had to reverse engineer one of them once. > The theoretical reason why this is possible and easy > is that nobody (human nor machine) has any interest in > or benefits from trailing whitespace. Yes, it's simple in theory, but very difficult in practice. I'm disappointed to see you of all people confuse the theoretical and the practical. BR, Robert Thorpe