Re: [Quilt-dev] [PATCH, RFC] Stop using patch option -E

[Martin Quinson]

Hello,

just for the record, we have a bug in debian to remove the -E option
since a long time, so I'm graceful to you for taking care of it. Here
is the url of the discussion:
http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=333480

Thanks, Mt.

On Wed, Dec 19, 2012 at 10:06:49AM +0100, Jean Delvare wrote:
> Hi Andreas,
> 
> Thanks for the fast reply.
> 
> Le mardi 18 décembre 2012 à 19:06 +0100, Andreas Grünbacher a écrit :
> > Jean,
> > 
> > 2012/12/18 Jean Delvare <address@hidden>:
> > > GNU patch version 2.7 and newer deals just fine with empty files,
> > > however our use of option -E breaks this feature. So stop using this
> > > option. Anyway, the manual page says: "Normally this option is
> > > unnecessary" and the test suite passes just fine without it.
> > >
> > > Andreas, can you remember why we were using option -E? I dug the history
> > > but apparently it has been there since the beginning so I couldn't find
> > > an explanation.
> > 
> > when patch is in POSIX mode or the patch format doesn't allow to distinguish
> > empty files from deleted files, patch deletes empty files only if the -E 
> > option
> > is given. If the -E option is given, patch always deletes empty files.
> > 
> > So if you want to use the -E option or not depends on which kinds of patches
> > you use: with "modern" unified or context diffs as generated by GNU diff or 
> > git,
> > you usually don't want -E; with other patch formats, you usually do want -E.
> > 
> > So I think your change makes sense; if people want -E, they can put it in
> > $QUILT_PATCH_OPTS.
> 
> That was exactly my thought. It's easier to add an option you want to
> $QUILT_PATCH_OPTS than to remove one that was hard-coded into quilt.
> 
> > > I suppose it may help get files deleted when using
> > > QUILT_NO_DIFF_TIMESTAMPS? But OTOH I would hope that GNU patch notices
> > > when the file name is /dev/null and acts appropriately.
> > 
> > Yes it does; the timestamps are not needed for that.
> 
> Thanks for the confirmation, the patch manual page did not make it
> completely clear. I'll do some more tests and if everything looks
> correct I'll just commit this change, with additional documentation.
> 
> -- 
> Jean Delvare
> Suse L3
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Quilt-dev mailing list
> address@hidden
> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/quilt-dev

-- 
Alvin: Sinon, le polymorphisme en C, c'est trop bô. :)
Emptty: Ca, c'est clair. Le C, j'aime ca. C'est un peu de l'art primitif,
   mais ca te secoue les tripes...