Re: What is the source code (was: [RFC] General Resolution to deploy tag2upload)

[Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk>]

Gerardo Ballabio writes ("Re: What is the source code (was: [RFC] General Resolution to deploy tag2upload)"):
> And if you relax the requirement and allow for history to be "edited",
> where do you draw the line?

Well, I'm afraid I just have to say that I think there *is* a line.
It's not just not hard and fast, nor susceptible to automatic
calculation.

This is a moral and ethical and legal question.  Moral, ethical, and
(yes!) legal questions often have exceptions and grey areas.
This is one.

Or to put it another way, when I say "the git history is usually part
of the source code", I don't mean "always the one and only unaltered
history that is never rewritten".  Like the question of whether the
git history is part of the source, the question of whether that
history can or should be rewritten is context-dependent.

I think *usually* the git history is part of the source, but sometimes
it isn't (and sometimes it's even harmful and must be discarded).
Usually you wouldn't (and shouldn't) rewrite the history, but
sometimes you should (and sometimes you must).

Ian.

-- 
Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk>   These opinions are my own.  

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