Re: early days before git's invention

From: Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com>
Date: Nov 8, 2009, 13:29 UTC
Message-ID: <m3ws21rvrd.fsf@localhost.localdomain>
In-Reply-To: <2986b3940911080423p4ccfe279ia00c995e1ea23fb9@mail.gmail.com>

Zhi Li <lizhi1215@gmail.com> writes:

Show 6 quoted lines

> I have a question maybe not suitable to be put on this list. I'm just
> curious on git and Linux history. As what was said on wiki, Linux
> kernel was maintained by BitKeeper, then for some reason, BitKeeper
> can not be used, so git was invented. My question is what was used
> before BitKeeper, CVS? I don't think so. Then, just using file to
> manage?

For why BitKeeper could not be used, see:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git_(software)#Early_history
  http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/GitHistory
  http://kerneltrap.org/node/4982
  http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/article/129776/after_controversy_torvalds_begins_work_git?fp=16&fpid=0

  http://better-scm.berlios.de/bk/demise-of-gratis-bitkeeper.html
  http://better-scm.berlios.de/bk/what-bitmover-got-wrong.html
  http://better-scm.berlios.de/bk/the-bitkeeper-ghost.html

Before BitKeeper Linux used tarballs (for releases) plus patches (for changes); patches were send by email (on LKML). Some maintainers used tools like Quilt (or custom scripts) for patch management.

P.S. FreeBSD (IIRC) used / uses CVS for version control, but it has quite different development model than Linux.

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland