[PD-dev] SVN?

[Stephen Sinclair]

> > Actually, it would be good if you did push the idea. :D  I think if

Okay then.. ;-)
It's a good discussion anyway..

I think these are all very good arguments for / against svn and git.

I'll just note that I've briefly tested out the Windows git installer,
and it is pretty nice.
I did get an error during a "clone" operation at one point, which was
solved by just doing the same thing on the command line.. (yes,
strange, but as you said, alpha.)

Svn is obviously way better than CVS, but I don't really follow the
arguments about how Pd is different from Linux.  In fact, I see a lot
of similarity between pd and Linux:

- a kernel that takes pretty intense "hacking skillz" to understand
and efficiently improve
- externals that add useful functionality (kernel modules)
- satellite projects that make it usable (abstractions)

Honestly I think that the only reason git (or at least, distributed
SCM) seems "weird" is because we're all so used to thinking in a
centralized way.  I'm not at all convinced that a "newbie" would find
CVS or Svn somehow easier or more natural than git.

Most of the weird commands in git are intended for doing odd things
like retroactively fixing a broken commit or to pull a particular
branch from another user's public repo.

Most of the time, git is like this:

git-clone http://some-server/pd-extended.git -- make a local copy of the repo
*work work work *...
git-commit -m "my fantastic new changes"
*work work work*...
git-commit -m "more fantastic new changes"
git-push (to my public server..)

Oh look there's been a nice update, and they've pulled my changes
git-pull
*work work work*...

etc.

I'm not claiming there would be no learning curve.  But I think there
are some advantages.

In any case, as I said previously, using SVN doesn't necessarily rule
out being able to use git along with it for those who want to.
There is a script, git-svn, which can be used to keep a local git repo
in sync with a public Svn repo.  So you'd work exactly as I described
above, but instead of the git-push command, you'd use git-svn and your
Svn repo would be your public repository.

(I haven't tested this much, so it would be worth "trying before buying.")

Of course then you're back to everyone potentially stepping on toes.
The thing I like best about it so far, especially since I've only used
it on very small projects, is that you can commit many changes before
actually publishing them.  So you can really think of commits as
"semantic building blocks" instead of as "publishing".  It separates
these two ideas nicely.

Anyways.. hm, also keep in mind there are other distributed SCMs
around.  There's even one that is more Svn-oriented, called SVK (which
I haven't used.)  I admittedly only jumped on git because of how it is
used for Linux, but also because I've noticed more and more projects
taking an interest in it lately.  Also I was very attracted to the
fact that you can publish your repo on a regular old http server
without requiring any kind of special apache module or installing
anything.  (Since I don't have access to install things on my web
server.)

I researched it for quite some time before actually moving one of my
projects to it, so I did consider things carefully.  So far it's been
quite a satisfying move.


Steve