Re: Emacs Bazaar repository

[Mike Mattie]

On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 00:03:09 -0400
Karl Fogel <address@hidden> wrote:

> dhruva <address@hidden> writes:
> >  With lengthy discussions having taken place on this SCM issue, what
> > are we waiting for? Are there really any concrete plans to move to a
> > dSCM or are we just wasting talking about features and shortcomings
> > of each tool. Any outcome of ESR study?
> 
> I think you may have missed the news :-).
> 
> We decided on bzr, which in practice seems to mean "some people are
> seriously testing bzr, and once we have a good conversion and are
> satisfied we can get work done, someone will install it on savannah
> and that repository will be the new master".
> 
> All of the DVCSs seem good.  No one marshalled any compelling
> arguments in favor of one versus the other on technical grounds, and
> all other things being equal, RMS (and maybe some others, perhaps
> including Yidong and Stefan?) preferred bzr because it is a GNU
> project.

All of them seem good from their press; until you use them and realize
some scale, most don't. When darcs was put forward as a candidate it
was clear that there was far more googling and e-mailing going on
than testing.

Now that people are actually trying them out some reality will filter back in.
You can tell that progress is being made because the strange metaphors, furious
hand-waving, and war stories have been replaced with _numbers_, and some sad 
faces.

There are three choices from here:

1. Backup, demand real testing and trails, make a new choice. (not very
   political)

2. The choice is already made, so fix bzr. May involve a complete re-design
   if the algorithms/structures are not designed to efficiently process common
   case access patterns (log etc.).

3. Let the issue die quietly because there is not enough man-power to divert
   from Emacs to bzr (who wants to volunteer?), continue using cvs
   indefinitely without rescinding the declaration to use bzr.

The GNU project is hoping for #2 as they want a real contender to git.
The numbers now being produced show why very clearly. 
For the GNU project that may be a very strategic choice in hind-sight
if #2 pans out. 

Nobody has been press-ganged so #2 is really not "terrible",
but Emacs has clearly been volunteered for bzr work, or the conversion
has been postponed indefinitely.

It's not my decision, and I am not making a position here either way.
I just hope putting the three choices in plain print will save some
electricity and mental band-with. 

Anyone who really groks the three options I wrote won't reply, because
it is simply the state of things, and how things turns out is a individual
choice for each developer of how they will spend their time, which is
why GNU does things like #2.

> The above is a summary of what I take to be the current state of
> things. My personal opinions: I'm also happy with bzr, and would be
> equally happy with any of the usual suspects among free software
> DVCS.  I just hope we can switch the master soon.
> 
> -Karl
> 
>

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