[Freeciv-Dev] Re: freeciv-test

[Jason Short <vze2zq63@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Raimar Falke wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 29, 2002 at 01:11:59AM +0100, Daniel Sjölie wrote:
>
> > We (me and Per) now have something kind of working and I put something
> > here explaining the purpose of this little project:
> > http://freeciv-test.sourceforge.net/
> >
> > Check it out...
> > And if you have a patch that
> > 1. works for you
> > 2. is aimed at freeciv cvs
> > 3. need more testing
> > consider joining our little party... :)
> >
> > Or if you just would like to help testing patches matching the
> > description above - then this is for you! :)
> >
> > Patches currently in freeciv-test cvs:
> > Sound (added today by Per so should be latest :)
> > - including sound wav-files...
> > Connection dialog (conndlg8.patch)
> So this is for people who know
>  - how to do a CVS checkout
> and who doesn't know
>  - which patches fly around
>  - how to apply a patch
> ?
It's not just a question of "knowing", it's a bigger question of effort. 
 Applying each new patch to CVS is a pain...each time a new version 
comes along each tester must revert and re-apply the patch.
It is also helpful to have one repository of a number of patches; that 
way all of them can be tested at once.  With ~10 patches available at 
any one time, that's a 10x increase in testing efficiency.  (Although it 
may take longer to track down problems if they do occur.)

> If it is so you may go through patches-submitted and apply all patches
> which do something the user may notice. Mhhhh the CMA isn't in
> patches-submitted.
>
> The problem I see and which only time will answer is how much work is
> required to have this tree updated and how much work are you willing
> to spend.
Yes, this is the question.

I would suggest that a side branch of the tree be kept in sync with 
"official" CVS.  That is, any time a patch is applied to the "official" 
branch it also be applied the <whatever> branch of freeciv-test (or this 
can be done on a periodic basis by updating freeciv-test to 
match...whatever).
Then, the main branch can contain all freeciv-test changes.  This can be 
updated from the side branch using CVS's branch-merging capabilities 
(cvs update -j).
The main point is to allow merging of incompatible patches with a 
minimum of problems.  If a patch exists on freeciv-test, and is applied 
in a different form to "official" freeciv, merging the changes back into 
freeciv-test is nontrivial.  One alternative is to back out the original 
patch (which may be difficult if it is mixed with other patches) before 
updating.  Using branching, the matching parts will be merged cleanly 
and other parts will be dealt with using CVS's "conflict" system 
(whereby the two versions are placed side-by-side, and you manually 
resolve the conflict).  A third alternative is to manually make the 
changes.  In my experience the second way is _much_ easier.


As I've said before, this process would be substantially easier using a 
development branch of the "official" CVS repository.  If CVS allowed 
giving commit access to only a certain branch, this would be a 
no-brainer...but since it doesn't (AFAIK), this would probably mean 
maintainership of the branch would go out to a few trusted people, and 
we'd have the same bottleneck we do now.
jason