RE: refactoring when using CVS

[Greg A. Woods]

[ On Friday, February 22, 2002 at 07:12:39 (-0800), Noel Yap wrote: ]
> Subject: RE: refactoring when using CVS
>
> --- "Greg A. Woods" <address@hidden> wrote:
> > CVS is not and has never been very useful for
> > initial development under
> > any methodology that doesn't involve sharing of the
> > code under
> > development (and sharing in a non-XP manner!).
> 
> I disagree.

then you are, sadly, disillusioned, and perhaps that explains why you
don't always grasp how to make effective use of CVS.

>  SCM by definition is the identification of what goes
> into a product and the control of changes into that
> product.  You seem to think that it's just the latter.

You are very wrong in your interpretation of what I think.
(as you often are, sadly)

The link between configuration and change management is much tighter
than you seem to realise.

> It's news to me 'cos you work under a different
> definition of SCM than the rest of the world.  Here's
> what I found when I did a google on "configuration
> management definition"
> 
> http://www.lal.in2p3.fr/SI/CMT/show/tsld002.htm

OK, and what part of those definitions do you believe are in any way
contrary to what I said about SCM coming into its full use after you've
made the first release?

> The original discussion, AFAIK, was comparing
> ClearCase and CVS.  I made a statement saying that CVS
> is not _ideal_ (it is usable, though) when
> refactoring.  If you look at ClearCase, it handles
> refactoring with ease even under a concurrent
> development environment.  Of course, you're also
> correct that refactoring requires fore-thought, it is
> a part of design after all.  However, with CVS, you're
> more apt to be forced to serialize development while
> refactoring while other tools handle it more
> gracefully.

It all depends on what you mean by "refactoring".

The refactoring required by XP does not necessarilly happen at the
implementation level, at least not initially (implementation naturally
follows, but the effect will be different than what happens when you
refactor an interface in the implementation).

-- 
                                                                Greg A. Woods

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