Re: [PATCH] Replace git-cvsimport with a rewrite that fixes major bugs.

From: Eric S. Raymond <esr@thyrsus.com>
Date: Jan 2, 2013, 16:18 UTC
Message-ID: <20130102161848.GA18447@thyrsus.com>
In-Reply-To: <20130102153933.GA30813@elie.Belkin>

Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>:

> The former is already loudly advertised in the package description and
> manpage, at least lets you get work done, and works fine for simple
> repositories with linear history.

Two of the three claims in this paragraph are false. The manual page does not tell you what is true, which is that old cvsps will fuck up every branch by putting the root point at the wrong place. And if you call silently and randomly damaging imports getting work done, your definitions of "work" and "done" are broken.

> Taking away a command that people have been using in everyday work is
> pretty much a textbook example of a regression, no?

That would be, but we are talking about replacing total breakage with a git-cvsimport that actually works and that you invoke in pretty much the same way as the old one. Nothing is or will be taken away.

In any case, once the distros package cvsps 3.x, old cvsimport will terminate with an error return, because cvsps-3.x sees an obsolete option that git-cvsimport tries to use as a command to treminate after displaying a prompt to upgrade.

The most we can accomplish by being "conservative" is to lengthen the window during which people will falsely believe that their conversion process is working.

-- 
		<a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>