[cvsnt] Re: cvs - '-n' parameter

[Tony Hoyle]

Aaron Kynaston wrote:
> The cvs client help reports that -n does the following:
> 
> 
>     -n              Do not execute anything that will change the disk.
> 
> 
> I'm assuming that means do not execute anything that will change NEITHER disk - neither the repository, nor the local sandbox.
> 
> Is this correct?

It commonly refers to the sandbox only - things like history may get 
written anyway.

In theory, but in practice there are few commands where -n actually does 
anything approaching sensible.  -n update and -n checkout are the 
commonly used ones.. I'm not sure I'd be prepared to definately state 
that others actually work (-n update only works if there are no joins 
etc. as merging branches requires file modifiction to make any sense, 
and switching it off just breaks it.  Not sure if that's fixable in any 
way.).

Tony