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Re: Possible bug with branch names and case sensitivity

From
Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu>
Date
Nov 23, 2011, 08:54 UTC
Message-ID
<4ECCB4D5.3090200@alum.mit.edu>
In-Reply-To
<CAG+J_DxREbykWggrD49L7qvR9M36wKL7+_kOYbvcWmLBCF2Gog@mail.gmail.com>
On 11/22/2011 06:31 PM, Jay Soffian wrote:
> I wonder what the downside would be of always using packed refs on
> case-insenstive file systems. This would seem analogous to how git no
> longer uses symlinks.

The theoretical downside is that when the total number of packed refs is very large, it is more expensive to access or change a single ref if it is packed than if it is loose (because the whole packed refs file has to be read, parsed, then rewritten, and thus scales like O(N)). OTOH the number of references must be quite large before loose references win, because the constant factor for loose references is much larger than that for packed references. I also believe that there is still scope for optimizing the handling of packed references to make them yet faster and perhaps even improve their scaling.

But I think that a lot of code would have to change to make this happen.
Michael
-- 
Michael Haggerty
mhagger@alum.mit.edu
http://softwareswirl.blogspot.com/
Previous: Jay SoffianNext: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
Message 5 of 11 in “Possible bug with branch names and case sensitivity”
  1. Gerd KnopsNov 19, 2011
  2. Jay SoffianNov 21, 2011
  3. Michael HaggertyNov 22, 2011
  4. Jay SoffianNov 22, 2011
  5. Michael HaggertyNov 23, 2011
  6. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonNov 23, 2011
  7. Joshua JensenNov 23, 2011
  8. Junio C HamanoNov 22, 2011
  9. Michael HaggertyNov 23, 2011
  10. Junio C HamanoNov 23, 2011
  11. Junio C HamanoNov 22, 2011

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