[darcs-users] more darcs marketing

[Peter Hercek]

Eric Kow wrote:
> On Sun, Apr 12, 2009 at 17:50:32 +0200, Daniel Carrera wrote:
>   
>> Another thing I like is that if I'm working on feature X and my boss  
>> tells me that he wants feature Y tomorrow, I can accommodate without  
>> even making a branch (feature Y being just a small change).
>>     
>
> Mark Stosberg invented the term 'Spontaneous Branch':
>   http://wiki.darcs.net/index.html/SpontaneousBranches
> Is that what you're talking about?
>
>   
I though he meant things like git stash 
(http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git-core/docs/git-stash.html) or 
mercurial queues. I use darcs revert/unrevert for subset of these things 
sometimes. Though a bit dangerous because last time I read about it, it 
was not well specified when the option to correctly unrevert is lost.

Spontaneous branches seem more heavy since if you want to use them 
locally you actually need to make a clone which is not good sometimes 
since it typically means longer compiles.


The only thing which still makes me follow darcs (or I should rather 
follow camp for this) is that it has at least some theory which gives 
you a great potential for future. Just a trivial example: imagine syntax 
aware patches - formating change would not ever cause a conflict! ... 
would be cool to have some support from an editor here too some 
formating defaults etc. But I think more than simple syntax aware 
patches could be done. It is a pity I do not have time to spend time 
with this now. If I'll find some time to spend on a VCS it hardly could 
be git/mercurial, but camp/darcs have a good chance.

Otherwise, AFAIK git or mercurial (possibly with extensions) are better 
from all points of view now. OK, I do not really know how good is e.g. 
git's cherry picking extension (I rarely use it even in darcs). But look 
for example at patch commutation. One would expect darcs to be better 
here, but git allows you to do it with its rebase command even for 
conflicting patches. Darcs does it automatically but only for 
non-conflicting patches (a pity).

Any list (on some web page possibly?) of features where darcs is better 
now (when compared to git/mercurial).

Peter.