From: Eero Saynatkari <ruby-ml@...>
Date: 2006-01-05T07:10:14+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby projects and interfaces to revision control systems (Darcs vs. Cogito)

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On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 01:40:59 +0900, mental@rydia.net wrote:
> It's lunch time, so here are my own (very opinionated) thoughts on
> the matter:
> 
> * CVS: As a large project maintainer, I've come to hate it.  It does
> "enough", but then falls down in places like commit atomicity. 
> Trying to isolate a commit by bracketing timestamps isn't fun. 
> Multiple merges to a branch are also so painful that branches
> should be considered "single-use".  No disconnected operation.
> 
>  Verdict: You'd have to be insane.
> 
> * SVN: Unambitious, but solid.  Clean.  Tries to fix the things
> wrong with CVS.  Succeeds, mostly.  Unfortunately, merging with
> branches is even worse than with CVS in the sense that you've got
> to manually grovel through logs to find merge points.  No
> disconnected operation.
> 
>  Verdict: Not bad.  A reasonable choice for most centralized
> projects.
> 
> * SVK: Uses SVN repositories, mirroring them locally.  Adds
> disconnected operation and a number of other things -- among them,
> 'svk smerge', which is the branch merge SVN should have had. 
> Written in Perl.  A bit slow occasionally.
> 
>  Verdict: Decent.  I use it for the SVN-hosted projects I
> participate in.
> 
> * arch: I've admittedly been a bit put off by the weird file naming
> conventions.  Mister SCM, stay out of my project's namespace,
> thanks.  But it does the things you want an SCM to do.  Focuses on
> the whole "distributed development" thing, and of course supports
> disconnected operation.
> 
>  Verdict: Probably good, but I can't bring myself to use it.
> 
> * Bazaar: Frontend to arch repositories, if I understand correctly. 
> I think it's supposed to be the next-generation arch.  Also, Bazaar
> NG is the next-generation Bazaar.
> 
>  Verdict: Probably great, but I've got no experience whatsoever with
> it.
> 
> * monotone: Interesting piece of kit.  Another decentralized SCM;
> repositories are .db files containing records of "facts". 
> Conceptually, a content-addressable filesystem.  Emphasis on
> digital signatures.  Configuration file is a lua script which is
> both good and bad.  Was maturing rapidly until one of the core
> developers had to leave because his employer used certain software.
> 
>  Verdict: Good, used it for a while but moved on.
> 
> * git: A fairly raw content-addressable transactional filesystem;
> objects and metadata are stored in a .git directory, gzipped and
> named by the hash of their contents.  Also supports "packed"
> repositories, with files containing blobs of deltas.  V. nice
> because you can easily throw repositories around with rsync, HTTP,
> etc.  Provides tools for performing transactions in a working
> directory, and cloning repositories.  It isn't really a complete
> SCM in the traditional sense, though you could use it that way if
> you're determined.
> 
>  Verdict: Great if you're Linus and/or trying to work around (for
> example) some SCM-related no-compete clause.
> 
> * cogito: Shell scripts on top of git which turn it into a real SCM.
>  Works nicely; takes advantage of the benefits of git, and adds
> quite a lot of usability.  You still occasionally have to dip into
> a raw git command here or there, but things go pretty smoothly
> nonetheless.  Not as nice about renaming directories as some modern
> SCMs.  Nice in that the SCM metadata directory is hidden, so you've
> not got an "MT" or a "CVS" or whatever directory staring you in the
> face.  You can glob with impunity.
> 
>  Verdict: Very good.  I use it for all my writing, art, and personal
> software projects.
> 
> * Darcs: Repository is a _darcs directory containing a pristine
> snapshot of the tree and a bunch of patches.  Darcs is based on a
> formal approach to performing operations on patches.  Favorite of
> Haskellites for many reasons.
> 
>  Verdict: Good, possibly very good.  Not used it much though; Cogito
> fills the void for me.
> 
> Have I missed any?

You missed Mercurial (hg), actually a fairly good one.

One point that may be important to many is that out of the distributed
SCM's that I have tried (git, monotone, bzr, mercurial, darcs), only
darcs supports output to a generic format, XML.
 
> -mental


E
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