121 lines
4.5 KiB
Markdown
121 lines
4.5 KiB
Markdown
It would be nice if something like `git format-patch`
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could be done that supports sending annex objects along with the git patch.
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Then something like `git am` would apply the patch and at the same time
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extract the annex objects, verify them, and inject them into the
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repository.
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Some email servers have size limitations, which could limit the
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use cases.
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## UI
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This could be done with either a wrapper around git format-patch
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or a subsequent command. Either way, it would examine the patch file
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to find the git-annex objects added in it, then modify it to include those
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objects.
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Similarly, a wrapper around git-am or a subsequent command to extract those
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objects and inject them into the repository.
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Which would be better, wrappers or post-processing commands?
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## optimal objects to include
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It seems that only objects added in a patch need to be included, not
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objects that are removed.
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If an object is removed and also added, we can assume that the receiver
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already has a copy, so no need to include that object in the patch. This
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will make renames of existing files avoid a redundant attachment of an
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object.
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When adding objects to a set of patch files, it can remember which objects
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it's added already, and avoid adding those to subsequent patches.
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That's close to optimal. But here are two non-optimal cases:
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1. A copy if made of a file. So the reciever already has the object,
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but the patch only adds the new file, so the object gets added to it.
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2. A special remote has a copy of some of the objects, and the reciever
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has access to it. Including any objects that are present in that special
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remote would be non-optimal. But other objects should be included.
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Both cases could be handled by adding an option to specify a repository,
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and if an object is in that repository, skip adding it to the patch.
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## patch mangling
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git uses base-85 encoding for binary patches, which is more efficient than
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MIME's base64. git-annex could do the same (sandi provides a base-85 module).
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The git patch format has two expansion points.
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From 4a3d9cb8f775036b0e0253730ea381d963e1684b Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
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From: Joey Hess <joeyh@joeyh.name>
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Date: Fri, 19 Jul 2019 14:10:14 -0400
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Subject: [PATCH] add
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---
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bash | 1 +
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1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
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create mode 120000 bash
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expansion point 1
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diff --git a/bash b/bash
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new file mode 120000
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index 0000000..a30f89b
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--- /dev/null
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+++ b/bash
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@@ -0,0 +1 @@
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+.git/annex/objects/k5/Zv/SHA256E-s1168776--059fce560704769f9ee72e095e85c77cbcd528dc21cc51d9255cfe46856b5f02/SHA256E-s1168776--059fce560704769f9ee72e095e85c77cbcd528dc21cc51d9255cfe46856b5f02
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\ No newline at end of file
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--
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2.22.0
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expansion point 2
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The second seems better, because it puts the big binary chunk after
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the diff so makes it easier to read. Although the ending git version
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is formatted as an email signature, so the annex part would go inside
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the signature in a way.
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git ignores anything after the signature, so putting it there also avoids any
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risk of confusing git if the annex object content looks too much like a patch
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to it.
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`git format-patch --attach` generates a MIME message. That would need
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a MIME library to deal with, and git-annex would need to add one or more
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attachments to it. But that option seems rarely used; I've never seen it used
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in the wild.
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## git-annex branch patches
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Patches to the git-annex branch are not handled by this. One consequence
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is that the receiver, upon applying the patch, doesn't add location
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tracking info for the sender's git-annex repo. Often that's fine;
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you don't want to bloat your repo with information about some random
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repo belonging to someone else when you can't directly access that repo.
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In some cases, other git-annex branch files could need to be modified as
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part of a patch. This should not be raw git-annex branch patches because
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the format of that branch is optimised for union merging and machine
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readability, not manual patch review.
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A diff between `git annex vicfg` might work, as a way to include config
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changes in a patch. But does not seem very necessary.
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More useful would be location tracking information for the web
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remote and perhaps other remotes that the receiver has access to.
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And remote state files: log.web, log.rmt, log.rmet, log.cid, and log.cnk.
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Also, it would be nice to be able to include git-annex metadata changes
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in a patch.
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Not clear how to know when to include these, because they're not tied
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to a change to the master branch.
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But room needs to be left to add this kind of thing. Ie, what git-annex
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adds to the git patch needs to have its own expansion point.
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[[!tag needsthought]]
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