Re: Content of Attic dir?

[Michel Blomgren]

On Thursday 25 December 2003 21:57, Larry Jones wrote:
> Michel Blomgren writes:
> > Does the "Attic" dir in a repository ever contain anything else than
> > removed files?  If it does, what else?, and under what cirsumstance does
> > it end up there?
>
> More precisely, it contains files that do not exist on the trunk.  In
> addition to removed files, it contains files that were added on a branch
> but do not (yet) exist on the trunk.  CVS creates it when it's first
> needed (i.e., when it first tries to put something there).
>
> -Larry Jones

I have a somewhat dumb repository, it's a complete tree of a Linux distro, 
that is, it's full of large tarballs (mixed with scripts, config files, docs, 
etc.).  Since I remove tarballs in order to upgrade (cvs rm -f tarball), I 
get a very fast growing repo, and I do have limited disk space (don't we 
all).  I really like that removed files end up in the Attic dir, it takes 
care of all my past backup crufts with my source-code-only programs, but in 
this repo, I'd like to delete removed files permanently (at some point).

Here are some more questions, assuming the following:

- If my repo never has a branch (it'll just have the trunk) can I be sure that 
the Attic only contains removed files?

- If my repo does have tags (but no branches) can I be sure that the Attic 
only contains removed files?

- "cvs tag" doesn't tag anything under the Attic?, that is, if I'm tagging 
things on the trunk (not in a branch, which I won't have anyway), or???

- If the above is true, is it safe to backup all Attic dirs (on tape, for 
example), remove all Attic dirs, hack away on the trunk, then one day, for 
some weird reason, pull back a file from an Attic (i.e. copy in the Attic dir 
needed into cvsroot/repo/dir/).  Will I be able to run e.g. "cvs add 
long_deleted_tarball" to get the file(s) under the Attic back into CVS at 
that time?

Thanks && Happy New Year!

        Michel

PS: I do have "-k 'b' -m 'COPY'" entries in the cvswrappers file that takes 
care of not substituting keywords in tarballs and other binaries.

>
> Oh, now don't YOU start on me. -- Calvin