From kde-core-devel Mon Aug 20 18:54:18 2007 From: Linus Torvalds Date: Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:54:18 +0000 To: kde-core-devel Subject: Re: clarification on git, central repositories and commit access lists Message-Id: X-MARC-Message: https://marc.info/?l=kde-core-devel&m=118764720327613 On Mon, 20 Aug 2007, Linus Torvalds wrote: > > This is one of the big advantages of true distribution: you can have that > kind of "central" tree that does integration, but it doesn't actually have > to integrate the development "as it happens". In fact, it really really > shouldn't. If you look at my merges, for example, when I merge big changes > from somebody else who actually maintains them in a git tree, they will > have often been done much earlier, and be a series of changes, and I only > merge when they are "ready". Btw, to see this in another light: as an example of a git tree that merges those same branches, but *before* they are ready, just look at the -mm tree. Now, Andrew actually ends up exposing the end result not as a git tree, but as patches, but what he actually *does* is to: - get my git tree - merge in about 30-40 other git trees from other developers (not all of which necessarily have actual development on them at any particular time) - then merge in his own patch list - expose it all as the -mm patch series So this is an example of how you actually have a totally separate, and still fairly central (the -mm tree is certainly now unknown outside of the core developer circles) tree, and where git is a big part in making a central "experimental" tree that is separate from my own central "development" tree. Also, it's an example of why centralization is bad: different people and entities have different intents. You could *not* reasonably do something like this with a centralized SCM like SVN. Linus