Re: [Gnu-arch-users] "tla commit" generates a patch-set even if there are no changes

[Julian T. J. Midgley]

In article <address@hidden>,
Tom Lord  <address@hidden> wrote:
>
>    > From: address@hidden (Julian T. J. Midgley)
>
>    > Aaron Bentley  <address@hidden> wrote:
>    > >The harm comes from changing the default behavior.  I have scripts that 
>    > >I run from cron that would be broken by that change.  tla isn't very 
>    > >user-friendly.  Scripts can make it smoother.  Let's not make tla 
>    > >script-unfriendly too.
>
>    > A little disingenuity is in danger of creeping in here.  
>
>No, a little wisdon.

I see no misspelt Cricketing Almanacs here...

>    > In arguing against the proposed change, you appear to be putting some
>    > inconvenience to yourself (and others with similar scripts) now ahead
>    > of the annoyance caused by a poorly chosen default to the thousands of
>    > developers who start to use tla in the future.
>
>I'll raise a yellow card there on the rhetoric:  unsubstantiated
>(i.e., made-up) statistics combined with an ad hominem attack.

This thread itself contains the evidence that a significant proportion
of current tla users seem to dislike the current default.  It is
reasonable to assume that a similar proportion of future tla users
will dislike it, and it also seems reasonable that "thousands" more
people will use tla in future.  There's nothing "made-up" about the
"statistics".  Aaron appeared to be arguing with particular regard to
/his/ reluctance to alter /his/ scripts, and to that extent the ad
hominem "attack" was justified.  And those in glass houses,
etc... re. your "wife beating" later...

>    >  - it seems, this early in tla's life, however, that that point
>    > hasn't yet been reached, and it would be a pity to avoid
>    > smoothing off the odd rough edge before tla achieves the
>    > ubiquity of CVS for the sake of avoiding inconvenience to the
>    > early adopters.
>
>Have you stopped beating your wife?

My turn to raise a yellow card...

Regardless, you've now convinced me that the suggested change
(addition of new flag) would not just inconvenience the early
adopters, but many other users, and so it would be wrong to make it.
However, were they to have been the only ones inconvenienced by a
theoretical change, I'd more than a little surprised if you disagreed
with my statement about smoothing off rough edges, so it seems
somewhat harsh to descend to allegations of wife-beating. 
 
>(And, btw, it's no longer "early" in tla's life.)

"early" is relative, Tom.  Compared to any other open source version
control system that I would even consider using, tla is at an "early"
point in its life.  It happens to be far superior to the competition,
in my opinion, but it's still a relative newcomer in terms both of
years of development and apparent numbers of users.

As it happens, you've convinced me that the flag is an inelegant
solution, and your log file changes will reduce the extent of the
problem to a manageable level, so I'll let it rest.   

Julian
-- 
Julian T. J. Midgley                       http://www.xenoclast.org/
Cambridge, England.
PGP: BCC7863F FP: 52D9 1750 5721 7E58 C9E1  A7D5 3027 2F2E BCC7 863F