[ANNOUNCE] GIT 1.5.4-rc4

The fourth rc for the next feature release GIT 1.5.4 is available at the usual places:

  http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/

  git-1.5.4.rc4.tar.{gz,bz2}			(tarball)
  git-htmldocs-1.5.4.rc4.tar.{gz,bz2}		(preformatted docs)
  git-manpages-1.5.4.rc4.tar.{gz,bz2}		(preformatted docs)
  RPMS/$arch/git-*-1.5.4.rc4-1.$arch.rpm	(RPM)

I was hoping that this would be the last rc before 1.5.4 final, and in fact the change between -rc3 and -rc4 is fairly small.

Notable fixes are:

 * http-push fixes (Grégoire Barbier);
 * fix to performance regression during partial commit (Linus);
 * ref/heads are now enforced to point at commit (Linus);
 * fix for fast-import reading some part of its own output (Shawn);
 * "diff --color-words" showed unchanged lines in metainfo color (Jeff King);

Also we have a handful gitk and git-gui updates.

This however still lacks two patches that I think we might want in the final (please see "What's not in 'master'" message). I asked for comments but I guess they were lost in the noise or something. It's not a very good sign that we had too many discussions on the list that are totally unrelated to 1.5.4, and I had to scroll back more than 1000 articles to skip them to find the announcement for the -rc3 X-<. So we will either have another rc to include those two fixes after getting feedbacks, or ship the final one with two known breakages. The former would be preferred, and it would be better if they can be done earlier.

Even though we had some RPM specfile changes that I cannot easily check myself, nobody reported breakages after -rc3. I am taking this as "no news is a good news", but it may turn out that nobody has been testing/double-checking, and it may come back and bite us when we do the final one. That's also something I cannot do much about.

But other than that, I think we are in good shape.

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Changes since v1.5.4-rc3 are as follows:

Bill Lear (1):
      Correct spelling in diff.c comment

Brandon Casey (4):
      close_lock_file(): new function in the lockfile API
      Improve use of lockfile API
      refs.c: rework ref_locks by abstracting from underlying struct lock_file
      fast-import.c: don't try to commit marks file if write failed

Christian Couder (2):
      git-gui: Initial french translation
      git-gui: add french glossary: glossary/fr.po

Christian Stimming (4):
      git-gui: Update glossary: add term "hunk"
      git-gui: Update German translation
      git-gui: Fix broken revert confirmation.
      git-gui: Improve German translation.

Dan McGee (3):
      Remove usage of git- (dash) commands from email hook
      cvsimport: remove last use of repo-config from git standard tools
      Update git-completion for new 'remote rm' option

Dave Peticolas (1):
      Documentation: fix and clarify grammar in git-merge docs.

Dmitry Potapov (1):
      treat any file with NUL as binary

Eric Wong (1):
      git-svn: handle leading/trailing whitespace from svnsync revprops

Grégoire Barbier (4):
      http-push: disable http-push without USE_CURL_MULTI
      http-push: fix webdav lock leak.
      http-push: fail when info/refs exists and is already locked
      http-push and http-fetch: handle URLs without trailing /

Jakub Narebski (1):
      autoconf: Add checking for unsetenv function

Jean-Luc Herren (1):
      Make default pre-commit hook less noisy

Jeff King (5):
      git-clean: fix off-by-one memory access when given no arguments
      color unchanged lines as "plain" in "diff --color-words"
      send-email: detect invocation errors earlier
      send-email: validate patches before sending anything
      send-email: add no-validate option

Jim Meyering (2):
      fast-import: Don't use a maybe-clobbered errno value
      doc typo: s/prior committing/prior to committing/

Johannes Schindelin (1):
      gitk: make Ctrl "+" really increase the font size

Junio C Hamano (8):
      builtin-commit.c: remove useless check added by faulty cut and paste
      Revert "builtin-commit.c: remove useless check added by faulty cut and paste"
      Fix git-rerere documentation
      Squelch bogus progress output from git-rebase--interactive
      Document lockfile API
      Officially deprecate repo-config.
      http-push: clarify the reason of error from the initial PROPFIND request
      GIT 1.5.4-rc4

Kristian Høgsberg (1):
      git-commit: fix double close(2) that can close a wrong file descriptor

Lars Hjemli (1):
      Move sha1_file_to_archive into libgit

Linus Torvalds (4):
      Fix performance regression for partial commits
      Make builtin-commit.c more careful about parenthood
      Make 'git fsck' complain about non-commit branches
      Be more careful about updating refs

Mark Drago (1):
      hg-to-git: improve popen calls

Mark Levedahl (1):
      git-gui: Makefile - Handle $DESTDIR on Cygwin

Martin Koegler (1):
      parse_commit_buffer: tighten checks while parsing

Miklos Vajna (3):
      Add using merge subtree How-To
      ls-remote: add -t and -h options.
      Include rev-list options in git-log manpage.

Peter Karlsson (1):
      git-gui: Updated Swedish translation after mailing list review.

Shawn O. Pearce (3):
      git-gui: Allow 'Create New Repository' on existing directories
      git-gui: Refresh file status description after hunk application
      Fix random fast-import errors when compiled with NO_MMAP

Thomas Zander (1):
      core-tutorial typofix