7 ms·

GNU Emacs conversion to Git

191 points by kfogel 12y ago

unwind 12y ago
Actually that was yesterday. :) I was confused for a moment, starting to think ESR was due east which is not expected (I'm in Europe). http://savannah.gnu.org/git/?group=emacs http://savannah.gnu.org/git/?group=emacs looks valid although I didn't try cloning.
talles 12y ago
A little more context here: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-01/msg00005.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-01/msg00...
talles 12y ago
I wonder if launchpad.net still bazaar only? Anyone knows?
- Argorak 12y ago
  The front page says it in the very first paragraph: https://launchpad.net/ https://launchpad.net/ bazaar is the provider for code hosting.
  - talles 12y ago
    Yes, but what about after you are inside it? Maybe they do offer other options but aren't really proud of it, at least not enough to put it on the first page. Anyway, I really think being bazaar-only it's a loss for launchpad. PPA's are great, but most people I know don't want learn bazaar just for it.
    - icebraining 12y ago
      Bazaar is really simple to use, though. If you know Git or Mercurial, you can learn it in 5 minutes, since the concepts map 1-to-1 and the commands are sensibly named.
apetresc 12y ago
I'll admit, I had no idea Eric S. Raymond was still actively involved in emacs development.
- abusque 12y ago
  He's not really actively involved, though. He's just been on a crusade lately to eradicate unwanted VCSs still used in older projects, including CVS for NetBSD and bzr for emacs. Honestly I'm glad he's doing it, I'm hoping it might make it more likely for newcomers to contribute to these projects. He has posted quite a few articles about these conversions on his blog [0], if you want to read about it. [0] http://esr.ibiblio.org/ http://esr.ibiblio.org/
  - vezzy-fnord 12y ago
    Wonder if he's tried to evangelize on the OpenBSD mailing lists yet? The smackdown from Theo would be amusing. To some extent, it's good he's doing this. To another, very few VCSs other than SCSS can really be called "obsolete", just primitive. Most of the time, people who go on about VCS migrations seem to be just bikeshedding and can't seem to give out specific justifications other than listing features that the upstream project likely doesn't need. It's not trivial either, changing a VCS often means changing the entire way a project is structured, for often uncertain gains.
    - syntheticnature 12y ago
      Well, I can pick on OpenBSD's favorite: CVS repository corruption does happen, but CVS has no active integrity checking. You'll only detect it if you go far enough back... or run a conversion program. If you're lucky, you discover while it's covered by backups, but these issues can sleep for years. This caused a migration I was involved with to just become a scrape, as the code at the tip was fine. (I'd also say that atomic commits are an excellent reason to leave CVS behind, but that can be argued.)
      - x0x0 12y ago
jaybuff 12y ago
Apparently the only feature emacs is missing is spellcheck.
- elwell 12y ago
  Flyspell, but good luck getting to run in MS Windows.
  - RBerenguel 12y ago
    I did back when I used emacs in Windows ME and XP (yeah, long time ago, happy non-Windows user for quite a few years)
  - astine 12y ago
    Run Emacs through Cygwin and Flyspell works just fine. I doubt ESR is posting from Windows anyway.
  - shoover 12y ago
    Works fine with http://aspell.net/win32/ http://aspell.net/win32/ and two lines of elisp.
  - ww520 12y ago
    Here's my .emacs setup for spell checking in Windows [1]. (setq-default ispell-program-name "c:/Aspell/bin/aspell.exe") For on-the-fly spell checking in various modes. (add-hook 'org-mode-hook (lambda() (flyspell-mode 1)) ) (add-hook 'text-mode-hook (lambda() (flyspell-mode 1)) ) [1] http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/AspellWindows http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/AspellWindows
  - josteink 12y ago
    Thank you for challenging these other fine gentlemen on this one point. Just today I was just looking into why I wasn't getting automatic flyspell-mode activated on my Git commits. Now it seems I wont even need to research it further :)
  - wglb 12y ago
    I think that 'jaybuff was being a little sarcastic. There are some howlers in OP.
tobiasu 12y ago
Finally you guys can all start sending patches to emacs. /s
- mongrol 12y ago
  Yep, first up. Replaceing elisp with javascript!
  - malandrew 12y ago
    Why? Scheme would be a better choice.
    - Spidler 12y ago
      Why not all three? All implemented in Threaded Intercal, just to be maintainable?
ForHackernews 12y ago
I'm curious why he doesn't like git.
- jessaustin 12y ago
  But he does. From last week: But I got to thinking, early this morning, about the fact that I haven’t been able to settle on just one VCS. I use git for most things, but there’s a use case git doesn’t cover. http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6502 http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6502
  - rtpg 12y ago
    Kind of weird because you can totally wrap git for this use case as well (not like you need to commit all changes to your working set into one commit, and pretty easy to filter per-file changes). A fun-seeming exercise anyways, I guess it doesn't matter what tool you're using underneath.
    - jessaustin 12y ago
      I thought his point was that these files don't have any relationship to each other, and that he would move them around on a regular basis. I can certainly see why one wouldn't want such files to share a git repo.
- rudolf0 12y ago
  He didn't say he didn't like git; he just said he prefers Mercurial.
hardwaresofton 12y ago
Awesome, this is going to make it much easier for lazy people (who are used to git/like git more than other options) like me to contribute to emacs.
- fletchowns 12y ago
  Every maintainers dream, lazy contributors!
  - josteink 12y ago
    To be fair, if you want contributors, removing every needless roadblock they may encounter is certainly a worthwhile goal. Using some archaic VCS which nobody has heard of, and which may or may not be available on your platform of choice, certainly doesn't help herd contributors to your project.
  - bronson 12y ago
    All contributors are lazy: http://threevirtues.com/ http://threevirtues.com/
dschiptsov 12y ago
bzr is so strange. If its connection got stalled (third-world GSM or WiFi) its "stream" would hang. If a process has been killed due to a signal, garbage would remain. And if you run bzr check it will use about half GB of traffic, as if comparing the whole repo byte-by-byte. git is much saner.
- tedks 12y ago
  And yet, this is the help page for git push: Updates remote refs using local refs, while sending objects necessary to complete the given refs. That's helpful! Thanks Git!
  - kinghajj 12y ago
    And for hg it's: > Push changesets from the local repository to the specified destination. :s/changesets/objects :s/local refs/local repository :s/specified destination/remote refs Is it really that much less easy? Both require that you understand the nomenclature chosen by their respective systems ('objects'/'changesets', 'refs'/'repository').
    - illumen 12y ago
      hg uses English that people would more likely understand, because those words were being used before hg existed. Git uses jargon it made up.
      - kinghajj 12y ago
        And you could argue that it's better to use new terms rather than existing ones that carry possibly-incorrect assumptions, no? "Leaky abstractions" and all that.
    - tedks 12y ago
      A change set is a set of changes. An object is totally unspecified. I know what a repository is when I work with version control. I've been using version control for years and I never was confused about what the repository was. What the fuck is a ``ref''? Git's shit.
Jacky800 12y ago
The repo "git clone git.sv.gnu.org:/srv/git/emacs.git" is not yet active. https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-11/msg00604.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-11/msg00...

191 points by kfogel 12y ago

Actually that was yesterday. :) I was confused for a moment, starting to think ESR was due east which is not expected (I'm in Europe). http://savannah.gnu.org/git/?group=emacs http://savannah.gnu.org/git/?group=emacs looks valid although I didn't try cloning.

talles 12y ago

A little more context here: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-01/msg00005.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-01/msg00...

talles 12y ago

I wonder if launchpad.net still bazaar only? Anyone knows?

Argorak 12y ago
The front page says it in the very first paragraph: https://launchpad.net/ https://launchpad.net/ bazaar is the provider for code hosting.
- talles 12y ago
  Yes, but what about after you are inside it? Maybe they do offer other options but aren't really proud of it, at least not enough to put it on the first page. Anyway, I really think being bazaar-only it's a loss for launchpad. PPA's are great, but most people I know don't want learn bazaar just for it.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    Bazaar is really simple to use, though. If you know Git or Mercurial, you can learn it in 5 minutes, since the concepts map 1-to-1 and the commands are sensibly named.

apetresc 12y ago

I'll admit, I had no idea Eric S. Raymond was still actively involved in emacs development.

abusque 12y ago
He's not really actively involved, though. He's just been on a crusade lately to eradicate unwanted VCSs still used in older projects, including CVS for NetBSD and bzr for emacs. Honestly I'm glad he's doing it, I'm hoping it might make it more likely for newcomers to contribute to these projects. He has posted quite a few articles about these conversions on his blog [0], if you want to read about it. [0] http://esr.ibiblio.org/ http://esr.ibiblio.org/
- vezzy-fnord 12y ago
  Wonder if he's tried to evangelize on the OpenBSD mailing lists yet? The smackdown from Theo would be amusing. To some extent, it's good he's doing this. To another, very few VCSs other than SCSS can really be called "obsolete", just primitive. Most of the time, people who go on about VCS migrations seem to be just bikeshedding and can't seem to give out specific justifications other than listing features that the upstream project likely doesn't need. It's not trivial either, changing a VCS often means changing the entire way a project is structured, for often uncertain gains.
  - syntheticnature 12y ago
    Well, I can pick on OpenBSD's favorite: CVS repository corruption does happen, but CVS has no active integrity checking. You'll only detect it if you go far enough back... or run a conversion program. If you're lucky, you discover while it's covered by backups, but these issues can sleep for years. This caused a migration I was involved with to just become a scrape, as the code at the tip was fine. (I'd also say that atomic commits are an excellent reason to leave CVS behind, but that can be argued.)
    - x0x0 12y ago

jaybuff 12y ago

Apparently the only feature emacs is missing is spellcheck.

elwell 12y ago
Flyspell, but good luck getting to run in MS Windows.
- RBerenguel 12y ago
  I did back when I used emacs in Windows ME and XP (yeah, long time ago, happy non-Windows user for quite a few years)
- astine 12y ago
  Run Emacs through Cygwin and Flyspell works just fine. I doubt ESR is posting from Windows anyway.
- shoover 12y ago
  Works fine with http://aspell.net/win32/ http://aspell.net/win32/ and two lines of elisp.
- ww520 12y ago
  Here's my .emacs setup for spell checking in Windows [1]. (setq-default ispell-program-name "c:/Aspell/bin/aspell.exe") For on-the-fly spell checking in various modes. (add-hook 'org-mode-hook (lambda() (flyspell-mode 1)) ) (add-hook 'text-mode-hook (lambda() (flyspell-mode 1)) ) [1] http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/AspellWindows http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/AspellWindows
- josteink 12y ago
  Thank you for challenging these other fine gentlemen on this one point. Just today I was just looking into why I wasn't getting automatic flyspell-mode activated on my Git commits. Now it seems I wont even need to research it further :)
- wglb 12y ago
  I think that 'jaybuff was being a little sarcastic. There are some howlers in OP.

tobiasu 12y ago

Finally you guys can all start sending patches to emacs. /s

mongrol 12y ago
Yep, first up. Replaceing elisp with javascript!
- malandrew 12y ago
  Why? Scheme would be a better choice.
  - Spidler 12y ago
    Why not all three? All implemented in Threaded Intercal, just to be maintainable?

ForHackernews 12y ago

I'm curious why he doesn't like git.

jessaustin 12y ago
But he does. From last week: But I got to thinking, early this morning, about the fact that I haven’t been able to settle on just one VCS. I use git for most things, but there’s a use case git doesn’t cover. http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6502 http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6502
- rtpg 12y ago
  Kind of weird because you can totally wrap git for this use case as well (not like you need to commit all changes to your working set into one commit, and pretty easy to filter per-file changes). A fun-seeming exercise anyways, I guess it doesn't matter what tool you're using underneath.
  - jessaustin 12y ago
    I thought his point was that these files don't have any relationship to each other, and that he would move them around on a regular basis. I can certainly see why one wouldn't want such files to share a git repo.
rudolf0 12y ago
He didn't say he didn't like git; he just said he prefers Mercurial.

hardwaresofton 12y ago

Awesome, this is going to make it much easier for lazy people (who are used to git/like git more than other options) like me to contribute to emacs.

fletchowns 12y ago
Every maintainers dream, lazy contributors!
- josteink 12y ago
  To be fair, if you want contributors, removing every needless roadblock they may encounter is certainly a worthwhile goal. Using some archaic VCS which nobody has heard of, and which may or may not be available on your platform of choice, certainly doesn't help herd contributors to your project.
- bronson 12y ago
  All contributors are lazy: http://threevirtues.com/ http://threevirtues.com/

dschiptsov 12y ago

bzr is so strange. If its connection got stalled (third-world GSM or WiFi) its "stream" would hang. If a process has been killed due to a signal, garbage would remain. And if you run bzr check it will use about half GB of traffic, as if comparing the whole repo byte-by-byte. git is much saner.

tedks 12y ago
And yet, this is the help page for git push: Updates remote refs using local refs, while sending objects necessary to complete the given refs. That's helpful! Thanks Git!
- kinghajj 12y ago
  And for hg it's: > Push changesets from the local repository to the specified destination. :s/changesets/objects :s/local refs/local repository :s/specified destination/remote refs Is it really that much less easy? Both require that you understand the nomenclature chosen by their respective systems ('objects'/'changesets', 'refs'/'repository').
  - illumen 12y ago
    hg uses English that people would more likely understand, because those words were being used before hg existed. Git uses jargon it made up.
    - kinghajj 12y ago
      And you could argue that it's better to use new terms rather than existing ones that carry possibly-incorrect assumptions, no? "Leaky abstractions" and all that.
  - tedks 12y ago
    A change set is a set of changes. An object is totally unspecified. I know what a repository is when I work with version control. I've been using version control for years and I never was confused about what the repository was. What the fuck is a ``ref''? Git's shit.

Jacky800 12y ago

The repo "git clone git.sv.gnu.org:/srv/git/emacs.git" is not yet active. https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-11/msg00604.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2014-11/msg00...