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Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files
From: |
Eli Zaretskii |
Subject: |
Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files |
Date: |
Mon, 14 May 2001 14:50:08 +0300 |
On 14 May 2001, Dan Jacobson wrote:
> >>>>> "RMS" == Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> writes:
>
> Dan> OK, I hope so, otherwise it would be sort of like "non-open source
> Dan> code"... at least as far as timestamps are concerned.
>
> RMS> We don't support the open source movement anyway, so whether we are
> RMS> "open source" is not a matter of particular concern.
>
> No I was meaning that the situation was not even up to the level of
> openness that perhaps some of the open-source guys would accept, not
> to mention the free-source guys.
>
> The bad thing I'm taking about is that the emacs developers would have
> a clear, handy and certain view of each emacs lisp .el file's
> modification time, whereas the emacs end user would have to go thru
> hoops to get it
I think you are making a popular mistake of confusing ``Free Software''
with ``unlimited access to the development process''.
As far as I understand, project which wants to be Free Software is
required to provide, for each _released_ version, the full sources and
all the auxiliary files needed to recreate that released version. There
are no requirements to do anything about development code or unreleased
versions. (Of course, a maintainer can do so if she so wishes.)
> Where in the past has the GNU end user not had the same view of GNU
> software as the GNU developer?
An end user almost never has the same view of a project as the
maintainers.
Anyway, IMHO this part of the discussion is becoming off-topic here. If
you want to discuss the philosophy of this, please take this discussion
to gnu.misc.discuss or some other appropriate forum.
> Anyway, preventing this information "monopoly" precedent from starting
> would only cost 0.01% increase in GNU software size, I'm guessing.
As I said (and you cited), this is not done to monopolize information,
but because keeping the RCS tags complicated maintenance.
> Eli> Past experience shows that this makes all kinds of trouble for Emacs
> Eli> maintenance.
>
> Can't there be some kind of auto timestamp mode enabled...
That would cause even more problems. These tags and timestamps cause
files to look as if they changed when no real changes were done.
- Re: dabbrev-select-buffers-function's help unhelpful, Dan Jacobson, 2001/05/02
- Re: dabbrev-select-buffers-function's help unhelpful, Eli Zaretskii, 2001/05/03
- please put version timestamp inside .el files, Dan Jacobson, 2001/05/07
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Eli Zaretskii, 2001/05/08
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Dan Jacobson, 2001/05/09
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Richard Stallman, 2001/05/10
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Dan Jacobson, 2001/05/14
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files,
Eli Zaretskii <=
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Stefan Monnier, 2001/05/14
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Kai Großjohann, 2001/05/12
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Eli Zaretskii, 2001/05/13
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Kai Großjohann, 2001/05/13
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Stefan Monnier, 2001/05/08
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Eli Zaretskii, 2001/05/09
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Dan Jacobson, 2001/05/09
- Re: please put version timestamp inside .el files, Peter S Galbraith, 2001/05/09