[Gnu-arch-users] Archive cycling

[Stefan Monnier]

After reading the tutorial and this list, I still don't understand the need
for archive cycling.  I've used CVS for several years on a an even older CVS
repository (it actually predates CVS and started as RCS) and have never felt
the need/desire for archive cycling or anything alike (except maybe for the
ChangeLog files that are now at revision 5000 or so).

So could someone explain to me why it is needed?  Is it specific to tla?

Also, while I understand that tla makes cycling reasonably easy (at least
enormously easier than CVS), it still seems annoying, since you have to
tell the world that the location of the head has now changed.

Also when cycling happens, you end up with a temporarily almost empty
archive, and since archive crossings are visible to the user (though fairly
painless), it is somewhat inconvenient since archive crossings will be
temporarily a bit more frequent (if people want to see what was changed last
month, for example).

All in all, it seems it would be preferable if we could move "the tail"
of an archive: i.e. keep the same archive as the head, but move old patches
to some other place (like offline/backup/slow/remote server).  It could be
done transparently to the people working on the head.


        Stefan


PS: I understand that this would break tla invariants such as "archives are
append-only", and also that this idea of mine might simply be the result
of my lack of understanding of what archive cycling is for, of course.