[Kde-scm-interest] requirements on git itself: ignore-if-not-present submodules

[Thiago Macieira]

Please follow my logic to see if this feature is needed and what it is:

in the proposed structure for KDE using Git, we'd have one repository 
called KDE.git, which contains submodule links to

	kdelibs
	kdepimlibs
	kdebase
	kdeaccessibility
	kdeadmin
	...

That way, if someone wants to check out all of KDE, they only need to 
clone that supermodule and tell it to initialise the submodules.

We also retain the ability of saying "this commit in kdebase requires that 
commit in kdelibs" by way of a supermodule commit.

However, what happens if the developer only wants kdelibs, kdepimlibs and 
kdebase?

If you don't initialise the other submodules, git will think they were 
removed. Your next commit to the KDE.git supermodule will remove the 
link.

So the feature I feel we need is for git submodule to ignore the 
submodules that were not cloned.

This is similar to Subversion's --depth feature in checking out.
-- 
  Thiago Macieira  -  thiago (AT) macieira.info - thiago (AT) kde.org
    PGP/GPG: 0x6EF45358; fingerprint:
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