Re: merge mode for XML

[Lee Sau Dan]

>>>>> "Sean" == Sean Hager <address@hidden> writes:

    >> No.  Not on extension, but based on *regular expressions*, or
    >> at least shell-style pattern matching expressions.  Extensions
    >> are too simplistic.  (c.f. CVSROOT/cvswrappers,
    >> CVSROOT/cvsignore)

    Sean> Extensions would work fine, pattern matching is overkill.

But the  code is already  there (for cvswrappers and  cvsignore).  So,
why  not reuse it?   I don't  think that  would cost  more development
time.

Moreover,  having used  Unix  for  10 years,  I'm  more accustomed  to
shell-style wildcards (not DOS  style!) as well as regular expressions
rather than a simple "suffix"  matching.  Moreover, many Unix users do
use  more  sophisticated naming  patterns  than  the simplistic  "name
extension".   I  think  this   is  why  wildcards  are  supported  for
cvswrappers and cvsignore.


    >> Yes.  Some mechanisms like ~/.mime.types plus ~/.mailcap would
    >> be desirable.  But one more complication would be the version
    >> of these external programs.  Maybe, CVS needs to keep track of
    >> which version of the tools were used for which file revisions,
    >> so as to reliably and faithfully reproduce any snapshot.

    Sean> This is a bit more overkill.  Admins should test and make
    Sean> backups before changing diff/merge programs during
    Sean> production.

Being  able  to  override  those  settings  comes  in  handy  in  many
situations.  And again,  that's not at all an  overkill.  It's easy to
implement, and it's already implemented for "~/.cvsrc".


    Sean> Even still, most updates in diff/merge programs
    Sean> would be to fix bugs and would not dramatically change the
    Sean> program functionality.

Putting such a high requirement  on the diff/merge tools may limit the
practical usefulness of this proposed architecture.



-- 
Lee Sau Dan                     李守敦(Big5)                    address@hidden(HZ) 

E-mail: address@hidden
Home page: http://www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~danlee