#5 Document svnmucc

[Anonymous]

Originally created by: cmpilato
Originally owned by: cmpilato

[Was http://svnbook.red-bean.com/trac/ticket/117]

We should add documentation for 'svnmucc'. Not sure where, though. It's a
client-side tool. Maybe there could be a sidebar near sections of the book
that call attention to operations that, with 'svn', can't be easily done in
bulk without intermediate commits (if such a section exists).

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: markus.k...@gmail.com

Also, please document how to use svnmucc to safely commit a change to a file without
going via any local working file. (Working directories and files are very cumbersome
if the author of say a CGI script wants to commit a change to a single file. That's
quite crucial for people who write web content-management systems that use Subversion
as the underlying database.)

http://svn.haxx.se/dev/archive-2008-09/0179.shtml

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: cmpilato

(No comment was entered for this change.)

Labels: -Milestone-en-1.6 Milestone-whenever

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: cmpilato

Note that as of Subversion 1.8, svnmucc has joined the ranks of the other first-class binaries.  As such, bumping the milestone to be less ... eternally distant.

Labels: -Milestone-whenever Milestone-en-1.8

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: cmpilato

Started documenting svnmucc in [r4314]:
   Sending        book/ch03-advanced-topics.xml
   Sending        book/ch09-reference.xml
   Transmitting file data ..
   Committed [r4314].

TDDO:  Write the reference matter for chapter 9.

Status: Started

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: cmpilato

This from an email exchange with Daniel Shahaf:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

>> Should this section mention the race conditions inherent to
>> working on URLs (with either svn or svnmucc) --- i.e., the option to
>> specify the edit's base revision explicitly?
>
> I hadn't yet decided whether to put that into this section or into the
> reference matter.  Since I (intentionally) didn't go into details on the
> relevant subcommands (put, propset[f], propdel), it seemed odd to mention
> the race condition here.  But then again, the race is the very reason why
> 'svn' doesn't offer this functionality itself, so maybe it bears spelling
> out here and repeating in the reference chapter.  What do you think?

I think it's worth mentioning it, as it's fundamental to how URL
operations work and is easy to miss (svnmucc won't error out if you
don't pass a -r option).  If you feel it's advanced, it could go in an
infobox / warningbox.

I agree there's no need to enumerate svnmucc's subcommands action verbs
(not 'subcommands', since more than one can be specified) in ch03, but
it'd be useful to say that _any_ commit --- tree modification --- that
can be done in Subversion, can be done via svnmucc.

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: markus.k...@gmail.com

I think that there really ought to be an example of how to achieve transaction safety when using "svnmucc put", otherwise only few will understand how to use option -r in practice to implement transactions that edit files safely. The example transaction could show something along the lines of

  $ latest=`svnlook youngest path-to-repos`
  $ svn cat -r $latest $url | sed -e 's/old/new/' | svnmucc put -r $latest $url

That is it should

  - look up what the latest version is
  - get a copy of that version
  - edit it
  - put it back while checking for (and ideally even handling) conflicts

all without using the file system.

By the way, is there any URL-based equivalent of "svnlook youngest $repo-path"? (e.g. "svn youngest $url")? Otherwise the example would need to include clumsy parsing code for the output of "svn info --xml $url" if it has no file path to the repository.

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: cmpilato

Markus, I agree with your comments, and will look to incorporate your suggestion.

By the way, the closest thing to a remote "youngest" operation that I can think of is:

   svn info ${REPOS_URL} | grep '^Revision:' | cut -f2 -d ' '

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: cmpilato

Calling this finished now.  The new bits may require further modification post-review, and I may find more places in the book where svnmucc's unique offering can be recommended, but the core of what needs to be said has been said.

Status: Fixed