[cvsnt] Re: Best practices for shadow sandbox

[Bo Berglund]

On Mon, 2 Jan 2006 18:45:02 -0500, "John J. Xenakis"
<mhare at jxenakis.com> wrote:


>Anyway, prompted by your comments, I experimented with it, and
>discovered a bug:
>
>>   cvs co sampleb\common\test.txt
>
>errors out with the message:
>
>>   cvs [checkout aborted]: no such directory `sampleb\common'
>
>However, the following do work:
>
>>   cvs co sampleb\common/test.txt
>>   cvs co sampleb/common/test.txt
>>   cvs co sampleb\common
>>   cvs co sampleb/common
>
>(In each case, run the test with no existing sampleb subdirectory
>below your working directory.)

Can't repeat...:
C:\Temp\cvstst>cvs co ModuleXX\Source\source.txt
U ModuleXX/Source/source.txt

C:\Temp\cvstst>cvs co ModuleXX/Source/source.txt
U ModuleXX/Source/source.txt

C:\Temp\cvstst>cvs co ModuleXX/Source\source.txt
U ModuleXX/Source/source.txt

C:\Temp\cvstst>cvs co ModuleXX\Source/source.txt
U ModuleXX/Source/source.txt

All permutations yield the exact same checkout of one single file in
its expected location...

This is with build 2182 on both server and client.

>>   Definitely! I think you should be an experienced user yourself
>>   before you start doing consultancy work on a product like this.
>>   Did you ever try it out yourself in serious work???
>
>Well, that's a nice philosophy of life, but if I had to be an expert
>at something before I could do it, then I'd never be able to do
>anything.  At any rate, I've used CVS on software development
>projects in the past, but I've never done an installation from
>scratch.

What I meant was that to work as a consultant with the task of
implementing something (be it CVSNT or whatever) is in my view
requiring a certain expertise in the subject. I would be grossly
disappointed if I hired a person to implement something and I then
learned that he had to go study the manual and in general learn
himself about the object of the consultancy during the consultancy
hours.
It is an entirely different thing to start using a system like CVSNT
yourself or as an employee where obviously you are not an expert until
some time has passed.
What I pointed out was caused by the fact that you gave me the
impression that you had sold your service to someone while not knowing
the subject yourself...

>
>>   Again, what are you referring to when you repeat "shadow". To me
>>   it sounds very strange.
>
>The "shadow sandbox" or "shadow directories" concept is used in VSS
>and is also described in the CVSNT manual.  It refers to a place
>where all files in the project are automatically checked out by the
>system whenever the repository is updated.

I was not aware of this *very new* feature of CVSNT when writing my
reply. I will study this feature and see what exactly it does. It
might even help me in my own projects....


/Bo
(Bo Berglund, developer in Sweden)