[SciPy-dev] The future of SciPy and its development infrastructure

[David Cournapeau]

josef.pktd at gmail.com wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 11:17 AM, Robert Cimrman <cimrman3 at ntc.zcu.cz> wrote:
>   
>> Hi Stéfan,
>>
>> Stéfan van der Walt wrote:
>>     
>>> Implementation:
>>>
>>> Enthought generously hosts SciPy, and I hope they will continue doing so.
>>> New software will need to be installed on the server, but we have many hands
>>> willing to tackle that task: David Cournapeau and myself included.  Before
>>> deploying to scipy.org, *we will configure a *different* server as a proof
>>> of concept.*
>>>
>>> 1) *Distributed revision control system: David Cournapeau and myself have
>>> been test driving Git [1] on SciPy and NumPy for a while.  It is fast, well
>>> supported, has great branch support, and is simple to use for the average
>>> contributor, while allowing powerful patch-carving for the more adventurous.
>>> *
>>>       
>> Going git would make my life as an occasional numpy/scipy contributor
>> really a lot easier, so big +1!
>>
>> cheers,
>> r.
>>     
>
> I'm pretty happy with svn; it is relatively simple and has good
> integration and GUI tools on Windows.

svn is simple for simple things - but those things are simple on
bzr/hg/git whatever too. Cloning, diffing, committing; those are the
same on every tool. More advanced things are really a PITA in svn - svn
is actually extremely counterintuitive IMHO. I mean, what's intuitive
about using copy to create a tag, really ? 50 % of the time I create a
branch for numpy, I screw up because I need like 10 commands, which fail
half of the time for stupid errors or time out. It is really a drag to
handle branches in svn, specially when it takes 10 minutes to merge 5
revisions (granted, this is at least partially due to the server hanging
up).

You're right that there is no decent GUI for git - tortoiseSVN has seen
years of development, so obviously, all the other tools are far behind.
And from a GUI POV, I think there are some deep, unsolved problems on
how to present things simply. I don't think anybody has found a solution
yet.

>  From all I read, git would be a
> big barrier for casual users (of git). From all the descriptions I've
> read, git is powerful for "command line junkies" who remember a large
> number of commands and options but not for occasional users of it.

Really, the basic commands are the same for all the tools out there:

http://git-scm.com/

But I am not denying that git has some rough edges UI-wise. In
particular, handling of remotes (forwarding changes to other
repositories) is still too complicated for simple tasks, and some error
messages are cryptic. But so is the case for svn, really.

> My main problem with trac tickets are missing tests, not the actual
> applying of the patch or bugfixes. I think low test coverage and weak
> testing "culture" is more of a problem than the revision control
> system. 

I agree that tools cannot solve the problem of lack of test. But to give
you a scenario: I had a couple of hours to spend on triaging bugs on
numpy for 1.3 release last WE. I have done almost nothing: I can't
easily get tickets with attached patches, I can't control the bug
tracker from the command line (I can't say: give me all the tickets
since 1.2 with attached patches, give me all tickets on numpy.core since
1.2, etc...). I find the whole workflow extremely frustrating personally.

cheers,

David