[Monotone-devel] mtn:// URIs

[Timothy Brownawell]

Short version: I'd like to use ';' as a URI argument separator, and 
error out if both a query parameter and a separate include pattern are 
given. Are there any objections to this?


> $ mtn sy 
> mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webohst?'net.venge.monotone.{viewmtn,contrib.{webhost,usher}}*'
> mtn: misuse: invalid pattern 'net.venge.monotone.{viewmtn': unmatched '{'

Using ',' as a URI argument separator conflicts with braces in 
globishes. This could be worked around by making the URI parser ignore 
',' if it's inside braces, but that's kind of icky. I'd prefer to use 
something like ';' as a URI separator instead. Sure it requires quoting, 
but you'll probably need to quote your URIs anyway...

> $ echo 
> mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webohst?net.venge.monotone.{viewmtn,contrib.{webhost,usher}}*
> mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webohst?net.venge.monotone.viewmtn* 
> mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webohst?net.venge.monotone.contrib.webhost* 
> mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webohst?net.venge.monotone.contrib.usher*

If you have globishes with braces and *don't* quote them, the shell will 
expand them. This was OK with separate include patterns, but it does bad 
things if the globish is a URI parameter (and would be bad in a separate 
*exclude* option as well)...

> $ mtn sy 
> mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webhost?net.venge.monotone.{viewmtn,contrib.{webhost,usher}}*

> $ mtn ls vars
> known-servers: mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webhost 
> a52f85615cb2445989f525bf17a603250381a751
> server-exclude: mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webhost
> server-include: mtn://mtn-host.prjek.net/webhost 
> {mtn://mtn\-host.prjek.net/webhost?net.venge.monotone.contrib.webhost*,mtn://mtn\-host.prjek.net/webhost?net.venge.monotone.contrib.usher*}

The entire URI gets turned into multiple arguments that each look like a 
URI. Then the query parameters on the first copy get ignored by mtn 
(when you give what it thinks are separate include parameters, it uses 
those exclusively), and you end up with an include pattern where all 
alternatives start with "mtn://...".

This could be solved with some fragile magic to collapse the multiple 
arguments back to one, or by erroring out if you have both a query 
parameter and separate include patterns (I prefer this option), or by 
erroring out if a separate include pattern looks like a URI.

--
Timothy

Free public monotone hosting: http://mtn-host.prjek.net