Disk Images and Version Control

[Joshua N Pritikin]

On Tue, Apr 22, 2008 at 01:45:21AM -0400, Michael Stone wrote:
>  * provide root access on some Linux host(s)  (or take great care with
>    fakeroot / qemu configuration) to allow others to work on the 
>    filesystem without screwing up file ownership and permissions

If you use GIT, you need to be extra careful here because GIT doesn't 
record ownership or permissions.

GIT is also poor at tracking changes to binary executable. When the 
Squeak/Etoys image was stored it GIT, the repository size quickly became 
unmanageable. That many things are written in python helps, but still 
there are many binary executables.

Even if your "primary" build is facilitated with patching the build 
directly, you still need to maintain source packages and insure that the 
traditional build-a-filesystem-from-scratch style of build still works.

I suggest a happy compromise: file bugs against any unnecessary 
filesystem state which is created when booting an image. Make it easier 
to patch the build, but don't rely on that method as the primary method.

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