Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Maintainership, and whiners...

[Mark Flacy]

On 2005.10.13 20:06, Martin Langhoff wrote:
>  This was tested extensively with kernel dev trees, which have some   
> nasty merges with very convoluted ancestries. I guess that one of the  
> reasons that the monsters in the dark that Tom talks about don't   
> worry  me is... if anyone has a collection of freak corner cases for  
> merges,  and low tolerance for the scm dropping the ball, it's the  
> linux  kernel  project.
>
> If they don't get bitten by the dragons, what are the chances that my
> puny projects will?


Because there are things that you would do in another language (say  
Java) that you wouldn't do in C.

For instance, I just might refactor some public class into two new  
classes, splitting the original file into two others.  I'll rename the   
original public class to something else, which will require the file to  
be renamed to match.  Most of the work done by the original class is  
now performed by the other new class that is package private but is  
nonetheless in a new file.  Most of the old lines of code would end up  
in the package private class.  I would consider the public class to be  
the true decendant of the original, despite the fact that it would  
contain fewer lines of the original code.

I'd be amazed if the guessing algorithm the kernel team uses would get  
that correct.