Can ClearCase be setup to work in Edit Merge mode? - version-control

I have a bad fortune of using ClearCase with UCM at work. We try to find a way to get user experience smoother while using it. One of the main problems is that all files are read-only until checked out. This interferes with using IDEs and their refactoring capabilities. Unreserved checkout changes little as it still requires perform check out explicitly. Can Edit-Merge approach be somehow emulated? For example, can ClearCase somehow make unreserved checkout on file modification automatically and not impose read only mode on them?

The way we approach the interaction between:
refactoring operations
ClearCase
is to use an IDE with a good ClearCase plugin:
The only way to preserve the history for files is doing the refactoring through an IDE like Eclipse without checkouting the files first: The ClearCase plugin will 'cleartool move' the files from their old name to their new names and checkout/checkin them, preserving their history.
The other manual way is less ideal:
You isolate that operation in a snapshot view in which, just for this refactoring, we clear up the read-only bit from all the files (so they are all in "hijacked" state).
Once the refactoring is done, we use the result as a source to import in a dynamic view.
clearfimport -mirror.
You can use a dynamic view as the destination, but the end result is new files with no link to their former filename.
The main idea being: you don't refactor your code every 5 minutes or even every day, so , with the right tool, you could have an acceptable way of mitigating the file-centric nature of ClearCase.

Related

Version Control with Structured Text files (*.ST, *.POE,*.bak)

I would like to do version control with my structured text project (I use infoteam openpcs) for industrial applications. The problem is that each time I modify an *.ST file, I get changes also in *.POE and *.bak corresponding files. Is there any nice way to do version control of this type of files?. For me, it is very annoying to follow version changes, because each time I modify onlye one *.ST file, I get the same change also in *.POE and *.bak. The thing is that I also would like to link this to redmine or TortoiseSVN and only see and/or recover the changes in the *.ST files. Is it possible?.
If you are not limited by which version control tool to use, you can opt for Git. It provides a way to ignore certain file extensions (to be more exact, ignore any files matching various patterns specified by the user)
This page has a nice explanation on this feature - https://www.atlassian.com/git/tutorials/saving-changes/gitignore

How to merge files(differentiate) in visual studio code

I am using Visual studio code for angular2 application. The requirement is to merge files, so, I want to differentiate changes in two files as it happens in Netbeans IDE. Is there, any extensions available to achieve the task in visual studio code.
For e.g - Merging Two files by differentiating changes like below:-
Please suggest some solution.
abc.component.ts (located in project1)
abc <-- text for understanding purpose
def
abc.component.ts ( located in project2)
abc
I want to differentiate two component files and push changes in another like it happens in Netbeans IDE? Is there, any solution available for Visual studio code?
First using vscode natively with the git toolset
(Make sure to look on the second title as it's a better native way!)
This way may be available on older version of vscode too! Still a good thing to know! (even we should always run on the latest version! And vscode is always keeping getting better and better).
A native powerful and cool way is to use the git toolset within vscode! It still not the most fluid way! But if you are in a setup where you don't have anything else or time or resources to use anything else! Also as a requirement you need to have a git repo initiated! Here we go:
First we will use the change and diffing capability of the git tool set. And the steps go as bellow:
Commit all the current changes
once done: copy past the other file to diff on the place of the current one. And save.
Cool now in the git pallet you can see the file in changes list! Click on it and the diffing editor will show!
Bingo this is it! You can compare and make direct changment! The diffing will keep happening in real time. Note the current state is in the right. And you make changement there.
Here an illustration of direct modification for instance the part in the left is missing from the current file
And here another illustration (current have in plus)
Well to sum up! Git tool and diffing in vscode is so powerful! And all that one need! The only problem is the extra step of committing and cleaning after if desired!
Here some tips! If you want to have the commit history cleaner! Or not have a merge separate! You can remove the last commits from history as much as you need: Without hard reset and commit again a cleaner one!
git reset --soft HEAD~1
You can check
How to cancel a local git commit
Otherwise it can be ok with atomic commit and merge mention!
Also if what you need is to be able to keep a lot from the current file! You can copy the current elsewhere! past the other file to compare! commit ! and then past again the old one! You'll have the old in the right and as current (Not as described on the above) In such a scenario this work well! (Hacky a bit but you may need it).
Native way (direct open of the compare editor)
(May require the newer version of vscode)
open a file that you gonna compare
open the command pallet
CTRL + SHIFT + P
type file: compare
You can see the different possible ways! For a file we can choose compare active file with.
Then you choose the file! The file need to be within the project directory.
And then you choose a file and the compare editor will open
The above was tested on my brother computer on a new vscode installation. I wasn't sure at first if it was part of the core! And i just confirmed that it is. That too remove the need to the method above involving git! And it's the best native way to go with.
Vscode extensions
Here two extensions i suggest the first:
https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=jinsihou.diff-tool
Easy and simple! It add two elements to the right click menu:
In current file right click -> Select as first file for diff, select one again to view the diff results
select to compare and compare with select no more simple then that !
Another extension to check:
https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=fabiospampinato.vscode-diff
I prefer the first! As this one compare a lot to the native way. And having the control in the contextual menu is just great.
Out of vscode! Using other tools
A quick google search and you'll find a lot of tools!
https://meldmerge.org/
meld merge is cross platform and open source and nice!
in linux and debian:
sudo apt install meld
Otherwise you can check the long list here:
https://www.jotform.com/blog/25-useful-document-and-file-comparison-tools/
https://stackify.com/code-merge-tools/
There is too winMerge to mention (an open source project for windows)
https://winmerge.org/

Package development for Sublime Text 2 with multiple files without restarting

I am developing a couple of packages for sublime text, and to avoid copy and pasting massive amounts of code I began to move my classes into separate files. I have been avoiding this so far, since, in my current workflow, changes to files that are not in the main plugin file won't get updated when saved and only go into effect when I restart sublime.
Is there a way to reload a package, including all it's files, without restarting Sublime Text?
You don't actually have to restart the editor. You will have to restructure your plugins though to take advantage of this. Essentially, you can load the plugin files from some top level file. As an example, take a look at Package Control. I also do it in PersistentRegexHighlight (though the package control solution is likely more robust (I did base it on that). Still not as good as simply saving a particular file, but better than restarting! In fact, you could probably tie into the on_post_save event to automatically save the top level file when you modify a child file.
I personally found the easiest solution was to install Package Reloader, and just put a new file in the top directory of my plugin named .build. Save your top-level plugin file and enjoy not having to restart.
Virtually no restructuring of code required.
From the unofficial docs:
Sublime Text will reload top-level Python modules from packages as they change (perhaps because you are editing a .py file). By contrast, Python subpackages won’t be reloaded automatically, and this can lead to confusion while you’re developing plugins. Generally speaking, it’s best to restart Sublime Text after you’ve made changes to plugin files, so all changes can take effect.
Unfortunately, plugins are not loaded into a scope visible from the console (Ctrl`), so you can't just reload() it. EDIT But, you can call reload() from within your top-level plugin file, as detailed in #skuroda's answer.
You'll have to make the decisions on when to break classes out into separate files vs. keeping them together in one monolithic collection. Having 50 files, each with only two or three function definitions is overkill in one direction, while having 20 classes each with 10 or 15 methods all in one file is going overboard in the other, so just do what feels best for the particular project. In my experience killing/restarting ST2 doesn't take too long in any of the supported operating systems (except on XP, for some reason...), so hopefully it's not too much of a delay on your workflow. One suggestion I'd give is to create a portable installation (if you're on Windows) with just the bare essentials in extra plugins if your startup time is too long.
Good luck!

Are there any apps that save backup versions of a file with one click (save, commit, etc) live while editing?

Just something that will save changes automatically, while i'm editing say in gedit, or notepad plus plus, or even windows text editor, etc.
I can't seem to find exactly what I'm looking for and svn, bzr, and Git are too complicated. One should be able to start a new project, start writing code, and that's it!
So... I'm going to create a whole new version control system that will be more amazing and simple than all the rest! Unless something already exists? Whether it be online, or a local install, whatevs.
EDIT: Ok, the above paragraph was a bit absurd now that I read it much later. I use Git now, and Git is awesome.
Many text editors will create a backup copy of the prior version when you do a save.
Of course, this is pitiful compared to an actual version control system. You should know that many VCS integrate with editors so commits are very simple quick commands.
The minor time it takes to create a repository is insignificant compared to the time it will save you during the project.
Frankly, this sounds like an argument from ignorance.
I found this nice little Gedit plugin: http://nerdblog.pl/2009/06/01/save-and-commit-to-git-plugin-for-gedit-2-26ave/

TFS 2008, remove file from source control but leave it in the project

We are using Scott Hansleman's suggestion for multiple web.configs from his post here. The problem we have is that we have to check out the Web.Config. If we remove it from the project, when we publish, no web.config is pushed. So we need to remove the source control bindings just from the web.config, but leave it in the project, and have the rest of the project still held under source control.
The issue is that source control makes the file read only until you check it out. We need to be able ot overwrite it with the prebuild events, preferably without having to check it out. Is there a way to remove the bindings from that file only, and still leave it as part of the project?
Thanks.
By adding a new file to solution explorer, you will get the little plus sign indicating it is due to be added to source control. Then, right-click and choose "undo pending changes". This will cancel the add but leave the file in your project.
If that doesn't work I suggest one of the following methods:
Use the Attrib task from the MSBuild
Community Tasks project to remove
the read only flag.
Use the Exec
task in MSBuild to invoke
tf.exe and checkout the file.
You should leave the file in source control. Otherwise you'll run into several issues:
changes won't be versioned. 'nuf said.
it can't be branched or merged, even though web.config is one of the files that's most likely to vary between parallel dev/test/production environments
changes you make locally won't propagate to coworkers without manual workarounds
developers setting up an environment for the first time won't get the file at all
Team Builds won't contain the file, so neither will your deployments. (surely you're not deploying directly from the desktop?!)
Note that the state of individual files is stored entirely on the TFS server. ('tf properties' dumps this metadata if you're curious) Only projects & solutions have bindings actually written into the file. And even those are dummy entries that tell VS "don't worry about me, just ask TFSProvider, it'll know who I am and where I'm supposed to be." While there are many other quirks in the VS project system that give me endless headaches, in this case it's your friend. Don't circumvent it.
Best options:
Edit your build script to toggle the read-only attribute before/after modification. If you're using the "copyifnewer.bat" script from the linked blog post, it should literally be one extra line. Even if you want to keep things entirely declarative within the MSBuild makefile, it's barely any work with the help of 3rd party tasks.
Use the File -> Source Control -> Exclude feature. After applying this setting, the file remains under source control, but will no longer be subject to automatic checkouts/checkins by the active solution. In other words, you can edit the file locally to your heart's content without affecting anyone else, but if you want to commit (or shelve) your changes you'll need to do it from Source Control Explorer or the command line.
Option #1 has the advantage of being a very quick fix for your existing setup. The downside comes from maintaining several copies of web.config.* Same reason why copy/pasting code is bad: if you change one, you have to go change all the others -- or worse, forget and let them drift out of sync until strange bugs force you to revisit the issue. This could be improved by changing the process so that there's only 1 "master" web.config and the additional copies only contain differences (via a textual diff engine, XSLT transforms, programmatic manipulation in Powershell, etc). Of course, that's more work.
Option #2 avoids #1's problems with very little overhead. (the engineering process itself is unchanged; only difference is how the Visual Studio UI behaves) This advantage is critical if you make changes to web.config at all frequently. Downside is that there is no built-in way to track variations on the "master" file. If the only diffs are dirt simple, eg a connection string or two, you may find it easiest to stick with just one "master" and let people make ad hoc changes on their dev machines. There are even tools to do this for you, such as Web Deployment Projects (easy) and the IIS Deployment Tool (complex). In any case your actual deployment should be automated and source-controlled, of course! If heavier customizations are required than these tools are capable of, then you'll probably want the hybrid master + transform approach described earlier.
I recently ran into the issue and could not find a good solution. With a little trial and error I was able to figure this out myself.
This works on Visual Studio 2015. I tried to follow the answer above, but 2015 does not have an "Exclude From Source Control Option" I could find. It does have source control / project integration where if you delete the file from source control or the project, it will automatically be removed from both places. This integration is enforced when you have the solution containing the project open.
The problem is when using a web.template.config, web.config is really a build output and should not be in source control. However deleting the file entirely and removing it from the project causes problems because then the file is not part of the Build / Publish steps.
So the work around turns out to be simple:
Close the solution. File --> Close Solution.
In the Source Control Explorer Window, Delete the file.
Check in the Change.
Open your solution and you will see that the Config file remains in the project.
You may see the Triangle / Exclamation Mark Icon warning showing the the config file is not found.
Rebuild the project and click on the file.
The file should now show without the warning.
It should not have the padlock icon next to it. This indicates that it is not under version control.
I did some more checking and found the "Exclude From source Control" feature. The key is that you need to select the item in the Solution Explorer window before selecting the menu item:
Select the Web.config file in the "Solution Explorer".
In the menus select File -> source control -> advanced -> Exclude Web.config from Source Control.
You will now get a Red Circle / White Line icon.
This works if the file is NOT ALREADY in source control.
If the file IS ALREADY in source control you need to do the procedure above to remove it from source control without also deleting it from the project.