[cvsnt] Re: CVSNT & File Permissions

[Oliver Giesen]

Tony Hoyle wrote:

> Hartmut Honisch wrote:
> > I recommend CVSNT 2.0.51d - it was marked as stable, and it works
> > for me - 2.0.58 (the current stable release) had some problems.
> 
> There isn't much wrong with 2.0.58d (nothing showstopper, anyway).

Unfortunately, apart from your continually stating this, this is not
really the impression I get from following the discussions here. Add to
that the fact that AFAICT changes between 2.0.51d and 2.0.58 were quite
more fundamental than in earlier releases...

E.g. the scrapping of old-style fileattr and replacing it with
something XML-based - not that I think that was a bad thing to do as
such - very much to the contrary - but this is very unlike most of the
other fundamental stuff you've added so far, like binary and compressed
deltas, custom encodings, atomic commits, the lockserver or renames.
All of those had to be used very consciously before they became
effective. Sometimes they even had to be explicitly enabled first. If I
wasn't interested in one of those features yet, there was still no harm
in upgrading to a version that supported them as upgrading alone did
not irreversibly change anything in my repository unless I explicitly
started to use those features. If a release turned out to be buggered
down the line I was still able to just go back to last version before
that (unless I had chosen to use those features already).

Now, AFAIHU fileattr gets (re)written as soon as I add or import files
or even just do something as simple as Edit, so there's pretty much no
way to delay "using" this new feature until it's proven ultimately
stable. In this case, this effectively renders my repository no longer
backward compatible to older versions of the server. So, in case any
more serious issues crop up with the release (the potential is always
there as you will have to admit) I will no longer be able to go back to
an earlier release.

That is probably the main reason why I am so reluctant to upgrade this
time and why, like Hartmut, I still recommend 2.0.51d to people. As it
is now I will probably wait for at least one more "stable" release and
then some before I upgrade again. And that even though up to 2.0.51d I
pretty much always upgraded on the spot as soon as you posted your
"Latest Updates" message... :(

Or is my assessment utterly incorrect here? Have you left open a
"downgrade path" for the fileattr stuff?

Another factor which strengthens this sentiment is that there *do*
appear to be an increased number of reports about permissions and other
problems (however minor) with post-2.0.51d builds recently...

And I don't even want to start about the more
minor/emotional/irrational gripes I have with the recent builds, like
turning "HEAD" into a branch and adding exclusive edits...


> I
> don't recommend using an older release as it's harder to support.

Perfectly understood. Another reason why I'm not at all happy with the
current situation (see other thread about problems with 2.0.51d).

Still trying to keep the faith...

Cheers,

-- 
Oliver
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