[Gnu-arch-users] Re: version aliases

[Miles Bader]

Stefan Monnier <address@hidden> writes:
> I'm sure this has been brought before, but I think it's worth thinking
> about it some more: tla should offer some way to refer to specific versions
> using shorthands.

I agree that would be handy, but I've noticed that generally I never
really use more than a single other distinguished branch name in such
cases, so have ended up with the concept of a `partner branch'.

One of the tla-tools scripts, called `tla-partner', embodies this
notion; here's the --help output:

   Usage: tla-partner [--help|--version] [TLA_ARGS...]
   Perform a tla operation with a `partner branch'

         --help       Display a help message and exit
         --version    Display a release identifier string and exit

   tla-partner supports performing tla operations with a `partner branch'.
   The partner branch is determined by reading the file {arch}/+partner
   (note that this file is never committed to the archive), and defaulting
   any missing components (archive or version) using the tree-version of the
   current tree.

   tla-partner has two forms of invocation:

     (1) Without any arguments, it prints the full version identifier of
         this tree's partner-version to stdout, and exits.

     (2) With arguments TLA_ARGS... it invokes tla with those arguments and
         the partner version as an additional last argument.  This is
         equivalent to doing:

            tla TLA_ARGS... `tla-partner`

         [The reason for this style of tla-partner usage is to make
         error-handling better when there's no {arch}/+partner file --
         it will exit with an error message whereas the above command
         would continue and invoke tla with only TLA_ARGS...]

   The concept of a partner version is useful when merging back and forth
   between different archives or different versions within the same archive,
   for instance, to see what needs to be merged, you can just do:

      tla-partner missing -s

   and to actually merge:

      tla-partner star-merge

-miles
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