[wp-hackers] Plugin Directory Bug

[Timo Kissing]

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Mark Jaquith schrieb:
> On Mar 19, 2007, at 6:52 PM, Timo Kissing wrote:
>
>> Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't it possible to move a tag with SVN?
>> So all people would have to do is create a tag named "latest" and move
>> it whenever they have a new (stable) version ready. This would mean a
>> little more work for each plugin developer, but it would not require any
>> changes to the packaging system and it would allow for tagging of beta
>> version, release candidates and other non-stable releases without the
>> packaging system having to "filter out" those tags when trying to
>> determine which tag "latest" actually should be mapped to.
>
> It's possible to use tags in this way, but it is sort of contrary to
> accepted SVN practices whereby tags are considered a snapshot in time
> that doesn't change.

Ok, I just read the SVN book[1] chapter about tagging and I can see
where this practice comes from. But I do not agree with it 100%. Having
a fixed tag for the latest stable release not only makes it easier for
the packaging system, but for human users that prefer getting their
plugins right from the SVN too without having to know which version
actually is the latest stable version.
And to think another step ahead: it would be possible to reference it
via svn:externals too.
There is even evidence in the SVN book that tags do not *have* to be
snapshots in time, just look at the vendor-branching chapter.
And to pull an analogy: on the www a documents URL should not change
either, still in every blog a lot of URLs point to different documents
depending on when you visit them (and a lot of documents have URLs that
change constantly) - and nobody seems to complain about that.

Of course that is just my opinion :)

Timo Kissing
[1]: http://svnbook.red-bean.com/
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