GIT problems for the "biber" package

[Danai SAE-HAN (韓達耐)]

Hi all

For over a day I have been breaking my head over Git.

My objective is simple: the current Debian master branch of the
package "biber" had version 1.5; just a few days ago version 1.7 was
released on their Git repository, and I want to update the upstream
version in the Debian Git repository.

However, in Git and gbp this is not so simple, it seems.  I tried to
import it with "git pull" and then manual import with
"gbp-import-orig" but each time I get lousy "Conflicts".  That is
bizarre: only debian/ is maintained in the Debian Git repo, the rest
outside that folder should be unaffected.

Git screws up all the original files.  At first I did not realise
this, but then I installed "meld" and manually copied and pasted all
the files that came up in meld (that was opened over a hundred times;
one for each updated source file; great workflow).

It still got screwed up, because dpkg-source is apparently confused
and wants me to create an extra Quilt patch with the same upstream
diff.  The poor fool.  What's more, Git automatically spawns .orig
backup files everywhere, so I had to remove them with find|xargs and
commit again.

I tried several times and cloned the whole Git repository again half a
dozen times, but to no avail.

As you can imagine, Git and I are not the best of friends.

So I kindly request your help: can you aid me in cleaning up the Git
tree and show me all the commands to get a proper new upstream version
in Debian Git?

AFAICT the problem commits that need to be reverted somehow are:
- d99e352a7042887b818b46fb472e4b4dfd1aaabb
- 53aef4fcb07f1948fcc734ca450482073aad9826
- ab8594ababde0404ce3c0256b52ade76f947b07c
- f033b2df4402362e2d45de938bb5ab002a5e0641
- 51f0b9ba9246f46da12eb3ca1e4adfad642eb73f
- a0ac1c2b0c7a87445c0b6136dbecd95072f39cd6
- 579bd5b7a8a64cfe642b15a040ab62a9b733f059
- 2c0936dc9f7cc02102230da485f3e25aba893af3
- 6acd70ce65db8b74061011e2db2101671d382c3f
- 432ca82baaa8cc106a7353ac3c0273c94c9b36cc
- 08c1aa5be4e9378c6eb91345a394484ee22e27b7


If possible, please show me how to keep the following commits (not
that they are difficult to re-implement, but I did it four times this
weekend already):
- 2cf2f599c3f1328b36495b312571fe960674c304
- e14bb4e25b4f2f4bed9e57edf76816e2726cae05


I would be grateful if some good soul could help me figure out what to
do to "revert" some commits and get back to the initial version 1.5
stage.  The following days I will be on a business trip in Jakarta, so
my email response will not be too fast, sorry.

You can find the Git repository here (I hope I got at least this one right):
gbp-clone --all --pristine-tar
git+ssh://git.debian.org/git/pkg-perl/packages/biber.git



BR


--
Danai