[cvsnt] Re: Mergepoints & Binary files

[Harrison, Andrew]

> From: Tony Hoyle [mailto:tmh at nodomain.org]
>
> There are two parts to a mergepoint:
> 
> 1. The automatic tagging, which is done by the client sending the tags
> from the last merge back to the server during commmit.  That's what
> adds the 'mergepoint1' data to the RCS file.
> 2. The merging itself, which is part of the general merging algorithm
> - the mergpoint acts as a stopping point when looking for the range of
> revisions to merge with.
> 
> Binary files get (1) but they don't get (2) as they're never merged.

Ok. I know that the binary files don't get merged, but they do get copied.
Why can't the mergepoint that gets written in (1) be used?

As I understand it, when merging branch1 -> branch2, the following rule
applies to binary files:

  if binary file has changed in branch 1 since branchpoint
    copy binary file from branch 1 into (branch 2) sandbox
    if binary file has changed in branch 2 since branchpoint
      raise conflict
    end if
  else
    don't copy binary file
  end if

When there is a mergepoint, why can't CVS do:

  if binary file has changed in branch 1 since MERGEPOINT
    copy binary file from branch 1 into (branch 2) sandbox
    if binary file has changed in branch 2 since MERGEPOINT
      raise conflict
    end if
  else
    don't copy binary file
  end if

Regards,
Andy

--
Andy Harrison - Platform Software Engineer 
Anite Telecoms Ltd. 127 Fleet Road, Fleet, Hampshire, GU51 3QN, UK
"No matter how bad things seem... 
...nothing could be worse than being used as a towel rail." - A.A. Milne

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