From: Johannes Schindelin Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2007 15:53:31 GMT Subject: Re: Basename matching during rename/copy detection Message-ID: In-Reply-To: <467A9B2C.2060907@midwinter.com> Hi, On Thu, 21 Jun 2007, Steven Grimm wrote: > Johannes Schindelin wrote: > > Yes. And Git explicitely allows what I call stupid. And yes, those > > _identical_ files in the test suit should probably all be folded into > > single files, and the places where they are used should reference _that_ > > single instance. > > > > Two files that are identical in the current revision have not necessarily > been identical from the beginning. Doing what you suggest will cause you to > lose the history of all but one of those files. > > Files can absolutely become identical in the real world. I know that for a > fact because it happened to me just this week (see my "Directory renames" > message from a few days ago.) No, that message did not convince me. It was way too short on the side of facts. And no, I do not think that two unrelated files can get exactly the same content. Be that as may, even _if_ there were such a case, I'd still try to reuse the same file in the working directory. Just because Git can deal efficiently with millions of identical files does not mean that a working directory can, or worse, human developers. Ciao, Dscho