[kwlug-disc] rcs (git?) integration/prevalence? [Was: CSS: varying colours based on inheritance]

Chris Frey cdfrey at foursquare.net
Fri Jul 8 13:28:27 EDT 2011


On Fri, Jul 08, 2011 at 11:54:42AM -0400, unsolicited wrote:
> Isn't one of the long time pros of rcs, though, the minimal storage 
> keeping revisions take? And doesn't Chris' point that full versions 
> are kept (even if zipped) diminish this pro?

Are we talking about git?  If so, then in practice, you still get the
benefits of diff space savings in the .pack files.  The implementation
and logic of how git works is just simpler to start with.  They
separate the content control from the space optimization.

Each time you do a 'git gc' it packs up the loose commits internally.

Concern about space is no reason to skip git for rcs. :-)  Once packed,
git repos are very small.


> From this thread, it seems that the most effective revision storage 
> options happen when the file type is understood. e.g. .txt, therefore 
> diff, and store changes only. There are a lot of file types out there.

Pretty much, yes.

I think there is no harm in a filesystem keeping multiple copies of
files, though.  Space and versioning are separate problems.


> Is this, in some sense, journaling?

No, not to my understanding.  Journaling is about filesystem metadata
integrity, not the content.

- Chris





More information about the kwlug-disc mailing list