Annotate of Log output wrong

[Ming Kin Lai]

This is to continue the discussion of the thread with the same subject that 
started on Dec 7, 2004.
The original discussion appeared to focus on the expansion of the $Log$ 
keyword both in the file and as output by the "cvs annotate" command (under 
version 1.11.17); but I think other keywords such as $Id$ have the same 
problem.  I am running CVS version 1.11.6 on Solaris.  After I committed a 
file that contains some keywords, (I did not perform a checkout or update 
after that,) the file in my working directory shows the following:

$Id: compiler.c,v 1.3 2005/07/12 03:10:28 mingl Exp $
this is $Date: 2005/07/12 03:10:28 $
$Log: compiler.c,v $
Revision 1.3  2005/07/12 03:10:28  mingl
this is my log ha ha ha

Revision 1.2  2005/07/12 02:32:17  mingl
third commit

Revision 1.1.1.1  2005/07/07 00:05:26  mingl
init import

And I ran "cvs annotate' which output:

Annotations for compiler.c
***************
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): $Id: compiler.c,v 1.2 2005/07/12 02:32:17 
mingl Exp $
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): this is $Date: 2005/07/12 02:32:17 $
1.2          (mingl    12-Jul-05): $Log: compiler.c,v $
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): Revision 1.2  2005/07/12 02:32:17  mingl
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): third commit
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05):
1.2          (mingl    12-Jul-05): Revision 1.1.1.1  2005/07/07 00:05:26  
mingl
1.2          (mingl    12-Jul-05): init import

> From the leftmost column, it is obvious that the latest revision is 1.3; 
however, the keywords expand to only revision 1.2.

1. Todd Denniston states that "If I Recall Correctly, $Log:$ is expanded on 
checkout, so the last
(chronological) log entry seen in a Log in a sandbox has not yet been 
checked into CVS.  Therefore, the repository knows nothing about it, and can 
not annotate what to it does not exist."  (Larry Jones says similar thing: 
"the $Log$ keyword (not command) is expanded
by checkout/update".)  I think the first half of the sentence is inaccurate: 
apparently the keywords are expanded (in the working file) upon commitment 
(check-in), i.e. no subsequent checkout is needed.  (What Todd probably 
meant is: $Log$ is expanded in the ,v file on checkout. - But see my Points 
2 and 3 below.)  And I think "check in" and "check out" should not be 
confused.  ci and co are two separate commands, aren't they?  The keywords 
are expanded in the working file on checkin, not checkout.  In fact, Section 
12 of the cederqvist 1.11.20 manual states " Embedded strings of the form 
$keyword$ ... in a file are replaced ... whenever you obtain a new revision 
of the file."  The way I interpret the phase "whenever you obtain a new 
revision of the file" is "in a working file that has a new revision number". 
 So, when you commit, you obtain a new revision.  You don't need to check 
out to obtain a new revision.  Now, what "annotate" shows is another 
question.  Section A.7.1 of cederqvist says "[annotate] print[s] the head 
revision of the trunk, together with information on the last modification 
for each line".   I will discuss that in Point 4.

2. Jim Hyslop says "I just created a test file with the $Log$ keyword and 
examined the ,v file.
The information in there supports what you (i.e. Todd) just said."  Well, I 
looked at the ,v file, which has the folowing:

1.3
log
@this is my log ha ha ha
@
text
@$Id: compiler.c,v 1.2 2005/07/12 02:32:17 mingl Exp $
this is $Date: 2005/07/12 02:32:17 $
this is a file
$Log: compiler.c,v $
Revision 1.2  2005/07/12 02:32:17  mingl
third commit

Revision 1.1.1.1  2005/07/07 00:05:26  mingl
init import
This is really the last line I added on Monday....
@

So, indeed, the keywords are not expanded to reflect the latest 
modification.  However, in Section 12 of cederqvist the word "files" refer 
to files in the working directory, not in the repository.  Keyword 
substition in the ,v files is undefined in cederqvist.  Hence, I don't think 
it is appropriate to look at the ,v files in the repository to understand 
the behavior of keyword substitution.  It is confusing to talk about keyword 
expansion in the repository files.

3. Todd says "the log entry not yet been checked into CVS".  I think that is 
the implementation detail that users should not be concerned with.  From 
users' perspective, all cederqvist in effect says is "After a local file 
with a keyword is checked in, the keyword in that file is expanded to 
reflect the new revision information."  Maybe Todd knows that the keyword is 
actually not expanded in the ,v file at the time of the check-in so the ,v 
file does not have the keyword expanded to reflect the new revision 
information.  But I am hesistant to use some undocumented implementation 
details, rather than cederqvist, to explain the program behavior.

4. cederqvist says annotate should print the last modification on each line 
(Sec A.7.1).  It does not say whether the modification is in respect to the 
local file or the ,v file.  Neither does it say what "modification" means in 
respect to keyword.  The user does not really "modify" the line that has the 
keyword.  It is the CVS system that "modifies" it by expanding the keyword.  
And apparently the local file is "modified" (in the sense the new revision 
information is reflected) as the user sees it.  On the other hand, the ,v 
file is not "modified" (but because cederqvist is silent on that, it can be 
changed in future release).  Nevertheless, cederqvist is talking about each 
line in the "source file" (i.e. the local file) not the ,v file - annotate 
is not printing revision info on each line of the ,v file, it prints 
revision info on each line of the source file.  So I guess it is reasonable 
to assume that he modification is in respect to the source file.  As it 
meets the eyes of the user, the source file contains a line that is 
different from the last version of the source file, that in my opinion would 
constitute a "modification."  The user may not even know how keyword 
substitution works.  He just checks out a copy from the repository that has 
a line "$Date: 2005/07/12 02:32:17 $ in it, and after he modifies and 
commits, he finds out the line changes to $Date: 2005/07/12 03:10:28 $.  To 
him, that is a modification alright.  And since annotate prints out 
"information on the last modification for each line", he should reasonably 
expect 03:10:28 be printed. Therefore I think the actual behavior of the 
annotate command is inconsistent with what is described in the manual.  
Either the program or the documentation has a bug.

5. Larry Jones says "the $Log$ keyword (not command) is expanded by 
checkout/update".
For the record, the annotate output is not affected by update:

address@hidden cvs update
cvs update: Updating .

address@hidden cvs annotate

Annotations for compiler.c
***************
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): $Id: compiler.c,v 1.2 2005/07/12 02:32:17 
mingl Exp $
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): this is $Date: 2005/07/12 02:32:17 $
1.2          (mingl    12-Jul-05): $Log: compiler.c,v $
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): Revision 1.2  2005/07/12 02:32:17  mingl
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05): third commit
1.3          (mingl    12-Jul-05):
1.2          (mingl    12-Jul-05): Revision 1.1.1.1  2005/07/07 00:05:26  
mingl
1.2          (mingl    12-Jul-05): init import

The update command does NOT do keyword expansion in the ,v file:

1.3
log
@this is my log ha ha ha
@
text
@$Id: compiler.c,v 1.2 2005/07/12 02:32:17 mingl Exp $
this is $Date: 2005/07/12 02:32:17 $
this is a file
$Log: compiler.c,v $
Revision 1.2  2005/07/12 02:32:17  mingl
third commit

A "cvs checkout" does not reflect the new revision info either.

- Ming Kin Lai

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