TopGit: Is there still a need for a long-lived build branch?

[James Vega]

On Tue, May 05, 2009 at 03:18:51PM -0400, Frédéric Brière wrote:
> I've recently converted my opencbm[1] package to TopGit, adopting a
> workflow similar to that suggested by Martin.  The main difference is
> that instead of maintaining a separate long-lived build branch, I'm
> exporting all patches directly on master.
> 
> Maybe it's just me, but I can't see the point in having a dedicated
> long-lived[2] build branch separate from master anymore.  It certainly
> made a lot of sense before TopGit, when all topic branches were merged
> into the (messy) integration branch.  But now, the topic branches are
> cleanly exported into debian/patches.

From my perspective, it's still worthwhile.  The build branch is where
integration of all changes to the upstream package happens.  This
includes pulling in the packaging changes (aka, debian/) which happens
on the master branch.

Files that are purely a result of the final integration (like
debian/changelog, debian/NEWS, and debian/patches/*) only exist in the
integration branch.  This provides a clean separation between the
changes I'm actively making to handle the debianization of the upstream
source and the changes that are only being made in the process of an
upload.

-- 
James
GPG Key: 1024D/61326D40 2003-09-02 James Vega <jamessan at debian.org>
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