Re: [boost] Losing history (Was: [git] Boost.Build location_

Subject: Re: [boost] Losing history (Was: [git] Boost.Build location_
From: Andrey Semashev (andrey.semashev_at_[hidden])
Date: 2012-12-27 12:07:16

On Thu, Dec 27, 2012 at 8:55 PM, Hartmut Kaiser
<hartmut.kaiser_at_[hidden]> wrote:
>> On 27.12.2012 04:28, Daniel Pfeifer wrote:
>> > 2012/12/26 Rene Rivera <grafikrobot_at_[hidden]>:
>> >> On 12/26/2012 11:48 AM, Vladimir Prus wrote:
>> >>>
>> >>> On 26.12.2012 21:30, Vladimir Prus wrote:
>> >>>>
>> >>>> On 26.12.2012 13:26, Daniel Pfeifer wrote:
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> 2012/12/26 Vladimir Prus <ghost_at_[hidden]>:
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>> I am wondering what will be the location  of Boost.Build after
>> >>>>>> the git switch. It seems to be part of
>> >>>>>> http://github.com/boost-lib/boost right now.
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> It has its own repository: https://github.com/boost-lib/build
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Oh, that's good. Will that eventually include full version history
>> >>>> from SVN?
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> In fact, could this repository be adjusted to be content of current
>> >>> tools/build/v2 ?
>> >>>
>> >>> There's very little practical reason to have history from
>> >>> Boost.Build V1 be present in git, and the "v2" directory at the top
>> >>> level makes no sense.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> What I would suggest is that we convert from svn to git manually into
>> >> our own repo (since the current bridge doesn't keep history). Then
>> >> push the new, full history version, into the boost subrepo.
>> >
>> > The current bridge is preliminary, but the final conversion will not
>> > convert history either.
>> > All libraries will start with a fresh git repository without history
>> > (History can be made accessible by grafting).
>>
>> Wait, what? As far as I'm concerned, conversion to git that loses history
>> is simply unacceptable.
>> Version control is used for software development for a good reason. Not do
>> I find it acceptable to impose history conversion task on every individual
>> developer.
>>
>> Can somebody from the Steering Committee clarify what's going on here?
>
> Frankly, that particular piece of information is news to me as well. Granted
> nobody ever explicitly said history would be preserved in the process (as
> far as I remember), but neither did anybody explicitly say it would be lost.
> And I missed to ask about this - doh!
>
> I agree losing history or having to manually preserve it is unacceptable.

FWIW, this was mentioned on the wiki:

https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/wiki/ModCvtSvn2Git

I think this was also mentioned by someone from the Committee on the list.