Files do not appear unique and other furry animals

[gwyn]

Based on some playing in the demo system:

1. I can add multiple files with the same name but there is no obvious way to tell them apart - i.e. no obvious unique id assigned to them even though the system does seem internally to keep track of them. When moving files around this becomes particularly hard to follow. Further, if I create a file, delete it and then add another file of the same name there are no clues that this is a *different* file to the original one. There are two; one historical (found be label) that is version 1 and one is current also shown at version 1. To all intents and purposes a casual glance will suggest that the current one is the same one that was in label 1. To determine a difference one needs to start looking at dates or history.

2. I created two labels ("baseline 3" and "baseline 4") in sub folders of folder 'gwyn' in the demo system. I did something between applying these two labels but it is not obvious what. How does find out? And why is it so hard to find out

3. I made changes to a label via. the Promotion option but although I can see the label has been changed 1 time I cannot find the details of that change. I could not find anything in the help either.

4. I created a higher level product "gwyn 2" which reuses "gwyn". I want to use an older version of "gwyn" as part of "gwyn 2" and label across the whole - effectively I have several baselines of "gwyn" and I want "gwyn 2" to use the non-current version of "gwyn" because I know that the previous release of "gwyn" is stable and I want to include that, not the current flakey development of "gwyn". I don't seem to be able to do this but this is a pre-requisite for sensible reuse.

[dan]

Based on some playing in the demo system:

1. I can add multiple files with the same name but there is no obvious way to tell them apart - i.e. no obvious unique id assigned to them even though the system does seem internally to keep track of them. When moving files around this becomes particularly hard to follow. Further, if I create a file, delete it and then add another file of the same name there are no clues that this is a *different* file to the original one. There are two; one historical (found be label) that is version 1 and one is current also shown at version 1. To all intents and purposes a casual glance will suggest that the current one is the same one that was in label 1. To determine a difference one needs to start looking at dates or history.

I believe the only way to add files of the same name is delete one and then add another with the same name. Are you saying you could add files of the same name to the same folder that exist at the same time? If so, how did you do this?

In terms of the deleting and creating a file of the same name, yes, that is how it works. The thinking was that it doesn't really matter whether a file used to have the same name - the contents will always change from version to version anyway. We couldn't think of a good reason to have a constraint that you can't add a file just because there used to be one of the same name.

2. I created two labels ("baseline 3" and "baseline 4") in sub folders of folder 'gwyn' in the demo system. I did something between applying these two labels but it is not obvious what. How does find out? And why is it so hard to find out

Go to Show Labels, and select the labels you want to compare, and then invoke Diff from there.

3. I made changes to a label via. the Promotion option but although I can see the label has been changed 1 time I cannot find the details of that change. I could not find anything in the help either.

You are correct - there is currently only the comment field that shows the changes that were part of a promotion.

4. I created a higher level product "gwyn 2" which reuses "gwyn". I want to use an older version of "gwyn" as part of "gwyn 2" and label across the whole - effectively I have several baselines of "gwyn" and I want "gwyn 2" to use the non-current version of "gwyn" because I know that the previous release of "gwyn" is stable and I want to include that, not the current flakey development of "gwyn". I don't seem to be able to do this but this is a pre-requisite for sensible reuse.

Use the Pin command to pin the shared folder at the version it is stable.

[gwynge]

I believe the only way to add files of the same name is delete one and then add another with the same name. Are you saying you could add files of the same name to the same folder that exist at the same time? If so, how did you do this?

In terms of the deleting and creating a file of the same name, yes, that is how it works. The thinking was that it doesn't really matter whether a file used to have the same name - the contents will always change from version to version anyway. We couldn't think of a good reason to have a constraint that you can't add a file just because there used to be one of the same name.

The problem is that when you have two files with the same name (not at the same time but in the historical sense) then you could see that one baseline (label) has a file c.txt version 1 and that the current situation is that there is a file c.txt version 1.... there is nothing to suggest they are different and yet they are. Now I know this is a contrived example but after 10 years of managing SCM these are the sorts of things that happen.

Go to Show Labels, and select the labels you want to compare, and then invoke Diff from there.

Then please go into your demo system and do the comparison yourself and tell me what changes were actually made; the output from the diff is clear but what ACTUALLY has happened - i.e. what is the real difference between the two.

You are correct - there is currently only the comment field that shows the changes that were part of a promotion.

Should be changed. Baselines are supposed to be immutable. The only way of creating a baseline is by using labels. Therefore labels should be immutable (otherwise which release 3 have I got?). If yu are going to allow changes then you must show them

Use the Pin command to pin the shared folder at the version it is stable.

What if I want a version of Gwyn 2 based on the last release, and another based on the UAT version and another based on development. Again, may be contrived but it will happen. If the Pin only allows you to point to select one then that is not always going to be sufficient.

[dan]

It sounds like you should use Branch rather than Label. Branch allows you to create another tree whose contents match the folder you branched from. Then you can modify either the trunk or the branch, and each will have a full history associated with it (and their histories will be shared up to the point where they were branched). Also, you can pin a branch if you don't want it to be modified.

One other note is that if you are interested in the actions that happened between labels (as opposed to a diff between them), then you can get that from the History Explorer by looking at the changes that happened between the two labels.

[gwynge]

One other note is that if you are interested in the actions that happened between labels (as opposed to a diff between them), then you can get that from the History Explorer by looking at the changes that happened between the two labels.

Exactly what I want... pray tell how I accomplish such a feat.... history allows me to see the history of something... I seen no way to use it to show what happened to the contents of the tree between label n and label n+1 being applied

[dan]

Show History on folder->View folder history by item->Action column

[Guest]

Show History on folder->View folder history by item->Action column

Sorry Dan, I must be being terribly thick but I still cannot see how I find what has happened between the two labels.

Can you be a bit more specific?

[dan]

Sorry to not be clear.

If you have labeled a folder, invoking history on that folder, or any of its subfolders or files will display "Labeled [labelname]" as the action in the "Action" column of the query results. Your query needs to encompass the labels you are looking at, and you can see which actions happened between those two lines in the results.

There isn't presently a way to query on the labels themselves (e.g., specify two labels in the history query dialog and have the history explorer display just the historical actions between those two labels). If this is what you were looking for, we'll add your name to the request (we prioritize features by how many people have asked for them).

[Gwyn]

Thanks Dan, now I understand... that works quite well... cheers.

we'll add your name to the request

does this mean I'm not the first person to request this particular feature.

As a result of trying Vault (and the quality of your support) I've definitely got a much better impression (and knowledge) of Vault than I had! I do think that each item does not to have some visible way to uniquely identify it though. And my other previous comments still apply even if there is some hack around them (I don't like having to create and pin branches to be able to adequately manage baselines).

It is much better than sourceunsafe and PVCS version manager though... and I haven't actually started looking at the change management yet.

[dan]

does this mean I'm not the first person to request this particular feature.

It is much better than sourceunsafe and PVCS version manager though... and I haven't actually started looking at the change management yet.

We had an internal request for it, but it has not been asked for by a customer yet.

Thanks for the comments!