Inconsistance in snapshots repository

[Alexandre Oliva]

Craig Burley <burley@gnu.org> writes:

>> > BTW, would it be possible to have a ``moving tag'' called
>> > `egcs_latest_snapshot', updated whenever a snapshot is released?
>> This is an excellent idea.  The only trick is to coordinate it with
>> the actual "release" of a snapshot.

> I'm CVS-unaware, but, generally, is this really guaranteed to provide
> a coherent snapshot to anyone, anytime, including if they try using
> it while a snapshot is being produced (and the "moving tag" updated)?

Nope.  If you checkout or update the moving tag while it is being
moved, you may get some files from the previous snapshot and some from 
the new one.

However, since snapshots are produced weekly, and we can count on
having this tag moved just before the announcement, there's high
probability that, if you update your tree just after getting an
announcement, it will be a coherent one.

Furthermore, if you fear you may have got an inconsistent snapshot,
just run `cvs update' again; if you get any changes, wait some time
for the moving tag to get stable or specify a fixed tag.

-- 
Alexandre Oliva
mailto:oliva@dcc.unicamp.br mailto:aoliva@acm.org
http://www.dcc.unicamp.br/~oliva
Universidade Estadual de Campinas, SP, Brasil