Re: ChangeLog to *VC-log*

[Stephen Berman]

On Wed, 09 Mar 2016 22:00:05 +0200 Eli Zaretskii <address@hidden> wrote:

>> From: Stephen Berman <address@hidden>
>> Date: Wed, 09 Mar 2016 20:30:32 +0100
>> Cc: Stefan Monnier <address@hidden>, address@hidden
>> 
>> I found the cause of the change in behavior I observed: it's due to the
>> elimination of files named "ChangeLog" from the Emacs sources (there are
>> now only files named "ChangeLog.<n>").  In consequence, find-change-log
>> creates an empty file named "ChangeLog" in the immediate directory of
>> the file in which `C-x 4 a' was invoked, e.g. in lisp/calendar/, when
>> I'm editing todo-mode.el; previously, `C-x 4 a' found lisp/ChangeLog.  I
>> guess those who don't see this keep an non-VCS-tracked file "ChangeLog"
>> at top level.
>> 
>> If we don't return to maintaining versioned ChangeLog files, I think it
>> would be desirable for `C-x 4 a' to always create (or find) the file
>> "ChangeLog" at top level when editing Emacs sources, since this would
>> add the required directory levels to the commit message.
>
> No, _you_ should create a file at top level, and then everything will
> continue working.  That's why the top-level file is called
> ChangeLog.2: to keep it out of your way.

But if Emacs can do that for me (and in so doing automatically comply
with its commit message format specification), don't you agree that's
more user-friendly?  Do you see a down side to having that automatism?
(Feel free to reply to bug#22968, if you prefer.)

Steve Berman