gmane.comp.version-control.bazaar-ng.general

Rustom Mody | 6 Oct 16:13

bazaar for documents -- facets

Bazaar is used mainly for source code versioning.  I was wondering if
it could also be of use for managing documents.

The differences I see are:
1. A document is likely to be much simpler than a code project  -- 1
single file would be quite natural
2. Sharing history of multiple documents may or may not be meaningful
3. Facets

A facet is like a revision/version but is in a sense orthogonal.  For
example one may want to maintain print and web facets of a document.

Or a salesperson wanting to make a pitch to a customer may wish to
take a ready template for the product and tailor it to a particular
customer.  A close approx to the need for facets in the software dev
world is when a software needs to be packaged for two or more OSes.

The key difference between a facet and a version is that versions are
intended to be merged into a final single product, whereas a facet is
intended to be different from other facets throughout its lifetime.
The key requirement for this is that one needs to be able to commit
into internal (non-tip) branches. ie if I have an original doc O with
two versions for customer Alice and Ben:

   A
  /
O
  \
   B

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Dennis Benzinger | 6 Oct 16:31

Re: bazaar for documents -- facets

Am 06.10.2008 16:17, Rustom Mody schrieb:
> [...]
>    A
>   /
> O
>   \
>    B
> 
> If I change the A tip then only the Alice version changes
> Likewise for B and Ben
> But I may also want to change O and have the changes available for
> Alice, Ben and all other yet to be made facets.
> [...]

You can create a branch for O and then create an A branch and a B branch
based on O. Then you can make changes to the document in the A, B or O
branch and commit these changes. If you make changes to O then you can
merge them into A or B. How easy this is depends on what kind of
document you are talking about. HTML files are quite easy to merge, but
merging something like DOC files is hard.

HTH,
Dennis Benzinger

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Ben Finney | 7 Oct 02:49

Re: bazaar for documents -- facets

"Rustom Mody" <rustompmody <at> gmail.com> writes:

> Bazaar is used mainly for source code versioning.  I was wondering if
> it could also be of use for managing documents.

I routinely use Bazaar for this purpose; it works well.

> The differences I see are:
> 1. A document is likely to be much simpler than a code project  -- 1
> single file would be quite natural
> 2. Sharing history of multiple documents may or may not be meaningful

The above two seem to apply just as well to programs as documents.

> 3. Facets
> 
> A facet is like a revision/version but is in a sense orthogonal.  For
> example one may want to maintain print and web facets of a document.

To avoid duplication of the document (and the inevitable unintented
divergence), this is best done by rendering both forms from a third,
source form of the document.

For example by maintaining the document as reStructuredText, and
rendering HTML and LaTeX from that via an automated process.

> Or a salesperson wanting to make a pitch to a customer may wish to
> take a ready template for the product and tailor it to a particular
> customer. A close approx to the need for facets in the software dev
> world is when a software needs to be packaged for two or more OSes.

(Continue reading)