[darcs-users] no more checkpoints, but hashed repos for GHC in Darcs 2.4?

[Petr Rockai]

Ganesh Sittampalam <ganesh at earth.li> writes:

> On Thu, 17 Sep 2009, Petr Rockai wrote:
>> For cache, this should be quite simple. For repos, this would be incompatible
>> change and we probably can't afford to do it just yet.
>
> Isn't it a straightforward format change? Add support to hashed-storage, add an
> extra line to the format to lock out older darcs and to drive the decision to
> read/write the new format, perhaps add a conversion command to darcs (otherwise
> make people re-get to switch formats), and that's it?
Well, yes, but I'm not sure we want to start proliferating formats. It comes at
a maintenance cost and code bloat. And it inconveniences users and I'm not sure
the performance gain is enough to offset that. Actually, the compatible change
that removes the common prefix of zeroes could already help with the problem.

Yours,
   Petr.