[Kde-scm-interest] [Proposal] Package splitting with thin meta-repos

[Pau Garcia i Quiles]

On Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 7:17 PM, Daniel Johnson <computerdruid at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Friday 29 January 2010 13:12:27 Pau Garcia i Quiles wrote:
>> 2010/1/29 ComputerDruid <computerdruid at gmail.com>:
>> > So basically I'm missing what action you need to do across the whole of
>> > KDE that isn't a "get everything" or "update everything".
>>
>> You need no new code. There's 'repo' for that case. But I'm not sure
>> we want to go that path. I certainly dislike it.
> I'd really like to know why you don't like it, especially since I perceive it
> to be incredibly flexible.
>
> I like the idea of using our own scripts if we were able to keep them
> incredibly simple, because then they could hopefully be very transparent (eg
> show the developer exactly what is going on during the clone operation).

Well, I don't.

I'd like to be able to clone the repositories using just git, no need
for helper scripts. If I want a helper, I already have kdesvn-build
(or that other tool Michale Jansen is developing, can't remember the
name). See my point? Either you use the tools alone, or you go with
full-featured tools like kdesvn-build. What you are proposing is
essentially a kdesvn-build-lite. There would be nothing wrong with
your proposal if we didn't already have two tools for that
(kdesvn-build and MJansen's). But we do.

>> As I said before, IMHO the need for something like 'svn externals'
>> should be fulfilled in git (i. e. adding a new subcommand to the git
>> suite, not creating our own command). I already pointed to a thread
>> where this was being discussed. Submodules only work for a very
>> specific case.
> But these type of external modules seems restrictive, since you're basically
> forced to get everything in that case.
>
> But even if you don't care about having to get everything, why is this better
> than a couple of quick scripts that setup everything before setting you free
> with a bunch of git modules?

Self-maintained scripts are prone to error, would need to make sure no
future decision made in git development affects them, may mean an
additional dependency (specially on Windows), etc

>> Oh, and regarding 'git clone --recursive', well, '--recursive' should
>> be the default, not the option. IMHO it should be exactly the
>> opposite: 'git clone --no-recursive' should be the option.
>
> This really is a minor detail. You only ever have to clone once, so it's not
> like it's a command you're going to be using every day.

(This is not KDE-related but git-related and should go to the git
mailing list, but still...)

Let me disagree. That 'minor detail' is very easy to forget, specially
when you don't know whether there are submodules. I only need to use
'git clone git://whatever.org/git/blah.git' when developing for other
stuff, why do I need to know in advance whether there are submodules,
then use --recursive or not? Sure, I could change my mind and from now
on always do 'git clone --recursive ...' but, why should I? Given that
there's nothing wrong with using '--recursive' when there are no
submodules, heck, make it the default!

-- 
Pau Garcia i Quiles
http://www.elpauer.org
(Due to my workload, I may need 10 days to answer)