[SOLVED] What the Crux is a "commit"?

[hazel]

I've just put myself on the Crux mailing list, and the first thing that came down the line into my inbox was something called a "commit" which looked at first sight like gobbledygook.

On second sight, I decided that it was a patch for samba. I don't use samba so there's no problem. But sooner or later I'm going to get one of these for a program that I do use, and I need to know in advance what these commits are and what I'm supposed to do about them. Do these patches need to be applied by hand? Or are they just a way of telling people to run a normal upgrade for that package? And are they sent out as a routine process or because the change is urgent, maybe security related? There's nothing in the Crux handbook or the FAQ about this.

[Jonathan183]

is it cvs commit?

[hazel]

is it cvs commit?

No, it was from something called git.

[oz]

No, it was from something called git.

You can get the meaning of commit and many other git oriented terms from the git glossary and gitwiki:


gitglossary(7)

GitGlossary - GitWiki

commit

As a noun: A single point in the git history; the entire history of a project is represented as a set of interrelated commits. The word "commit" is often used by git in the same places other revision control systems use the words "revision" or "version". Also used as a short hand for commit object.

As a verb: The action of storing a new snapshot of the project's state in the git history, by creating a new commit representing the current state of the index and advancing current HEAD (current branch head) to point at the new commit.

[hazel]

You can get the meaning of commit and many other git oriented terms from the git glossary and gitwiki:


gitglossary(7)

GitGlossary - GitWiki

Well, sorry, that is all Greek to me. It gives me the same sort of sinking feeling that Sourceforge did. All I really need to know is whether I am supposed to do anything about notices like these, when they refer to packages that I have on my system.

[KingX]

Well a "commit" means that one of the developers have "committed" new code/patch to the program to fix/add a feature or something and it is available to the public. If you want to run a "super bleeding edge" system you would download the source and compile the program to have the latest code running on your machine. Git lets developers work on separate areas of a program independently of each other and then they can bring the code together once they feel that their part of the code is sufficiently stable.

So git gives you access to where the developers put all their "stable" code together. Do you have to do anything with it? depends if you are in dire need of checking the latest and greatest code they have made available.. then you can download the source and compile and run it. I personally would recommend just waiting till they officially release a build for public consumption.

[hazel]

Well a "commit" means that one of the developers have "committed" new code/patch to the program to fix/add a feature or something and it is available to the public. If you want to run a "super bleeding edge" system you would download the source and compile the program to have the latest code running on your machine. ...Do you have to do anything with it? depends if you are in dire need of checking the latest and greatest code they have made available.. then you can download the source and compile and run it. I personally would recommend just waiting till they officially release a build for public consumption.

Now that is a useful answer! Personally I don't like bleeding edges; I'm too old for that sort of caper. That's why I left Gentoo and that's why I decided not to install Arch (though I was tempted to). OK, so in future I shall ignore commit notices unless they specifically say they are security patches.

[KingX]

...OK, so in future I shall ignore commit notices unless they specifically say they are security patches.

That sounds like a good plan, I would even ignore those to an extent if they only dealt with some very remote condition that somehow causes foreign code to be executed. But that's just me