Re: git-cvsimport bug with dates

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Nov 16, 2007, 06:06 UTC
Message-ID: <7vr6iq207f.fsf@gitster.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <51419b2c0711152059q55ced86gd224310c8c4a1851@mail.gmail.com>

"Elijah Newren" <newren@gmail.com> writes:

Show 8 quoted lines

> $ git diff @{2007-10-01}
> warning: Log for '' only goes back to Wed, 24 Oct 2007 19:31:38 +0000.
> fatal: bad object @{2007-10-01}
>
>
> It appears that passing a date to git diff on any repository imported
> by git-cvsimport will show this error, as long as the date is prior to
> when the repository was imported.

That is not a cvsimport specific issue.

When you use "branch@{date}" notation, you are not asking a question on the project history, but a question on the local view from _your_ repository on that project.

	$ git log --since=3.days.ago master

asks "go back from the master tip and show commits until you hit the commit made earlier than that date and stop traversing".

On the other hand,

	$ git show master@{3.days.ago}

asks "show the commit that was the tip of 'master' branch in my repository three days ago." Maybe you pulled from your upstream 5 minutes ago, and the last time before that, you pulled three weeks ago and did not do any development on the branch. In such a case, the latter question will give you the tip of your 'master' as of three weeks ago which is the same as of three days ago.