Paul Eggert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Simon Josefsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > >> I find these markers useful when comparing file dates when updating >> old software, and I think it would be a clear disadvantage if moving >> to git won't make the same thing possible. > > They are controversial. I'd rather remove them, at least in the files > I help maintain. They cause me more problems than they cure, because > they introduce spurious changes. Call me an Aristotelian if you like, > but I prefer to keep metadata separate from data.
Problem is that CVS meta-data is typically not preserved in the stuff that you get as end-user, which sometimes is the only source you have when doing some archaeological expedition into old code. Ideally, I'd like for the CVS (or git, or whatever) meta-data to be exported and distributed along with the source code. Using cvs2cl to generate ChangeLog's from cvs log does a big part of that, but it isn't a perfect solution. > While I'm throwing oil onto the fire, I have a similar opinion of the > version numbers we maintain in the .m4 files. They're even worse, > since they're maintained by hand. FWIW, I have never understood the point of those version numbers. The only reason that I can imagine, of maintaining version numbers on .m4 files, is if there is some shared library alike versioning for backwards compatibility going on, but there isn't, as far as I know. I'd be happy to drop those fields too. They don't contain a date, and are not reliably updated, so I don't see any practical purpose for them. /Simon
