Date: Sun, 30 Oct 2005 16:58:12 -0800 (PST)
From: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
To: Rob Landley <rob@landley.net>
cc: Jeff Garzik <jgarzik@pobox.com>, Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>,
       linux-ide@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [git patches] 2.6.x libata updates
In-Reply-To: <200510301731.47825.rob@landley.net>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0510301654310.27915@g5.osdl.org>
References: <20051029182228.GA14495@havoc.gtf.org> <200510300644.20225.rob@landley.net>
 <Pine.LNX.4.64.0510301435520.27915@g5.osdl.org> <200510301731.47825.rob@landley.net>
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On Sun, 30 Oct 2005, Rob Landley wrote:
> 
> I know there isn't an absolute or stable ordering, but can't a temporary 
> ordering be exported?

Not generally, no. And definitely not easily.

> I was under the impression that the bk->cvs gateway squashed changes into a 
> sort of order, way back when.

I have to say that the bk->cvs gateway is actually a very impressive 
linearization, and I don't even know how it did it. But even that one 
wasn't perfect - occasionally it ended up with big patches for merges.

Using "git bisect" to generate successive bisections (and then building up 
a linearization patch from that) would work, but it would result in some 
_really_ strange things: it would basically have one patch do one thing, 
then the next patch might _undo_ that, and do another, and then the third 
patch would re-do it and do them both together.

And that's really sometimes the best linearization you can do. But that's 
just too strange and confusing, I think. And the patches would be horribly 
inefficient.

At that point I'd rather teach people to use "git bisect" natively. It 
wouldn't be any less confusing than the patches ;)

		Linus
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