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Author Re: Migrating a system incrementally. Was: Re: Static vs. Dynamic typing (big advant
Robert C. Martin

2004-07-23, 3:57 am

On Wed, 21 Jul 2004 15:43:39 -0700, Alan Balmer <albalmer@att.net>
wrote:

>On Wed, 21 Jul 2004 13:12:42 -0500, Robert C. Martin
><unclebob@objectmentor.com> wrote:
>
>
>OK, realizing that the periods during which the system may be "broken"
>lengthen as well. Not in direct proportion, but the granularity can be
>far greater than the 10 minute figure that's been bandied about ;-)


No, that really is my point. You *can* keep the system functioning
while altering it in cycles of 10 minutes or less.

>You are correct that merges are error prone. I'm not convinced that a
>dozen small merges is any less error prone than one larger one,
>though.


Try it some time. Often tiny merges don't generate any conflicts.
Large merges generate more conflicts than tiny ones. Large merges
take a long time to do. During that time someone else may change the
code again, forcing yet another merge.

>A typical change to a module may take a day to a w, and
>merging every time a few lines of code are changed would make hash of
>our version control system and accomplish nothing useful.


Why do you think your version control system would get hashed?
Perhaps you need one that is a bit more flexible. I find CVS to be
quite tolerant of frequent updates and merges.



-----
Robert C. Martin (Uncle Bob)
Object Mentor Inc.
unclebob @ objectmentor . com
800-338-6716

"The aim of science is not to open the door to infinite wisdom,
but to set a limit to infinite error."
-- Bertolt Brecht, Life of Galileo
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