[Numpy-discussion] [IPython-dev] mercurial now has free hosting too

[David Cournapeau]

Gael Varoquaux wrote:
>
> Except that very often when you do a "bzr up" you have to do a merge
> because bzr makes obvious branching that is implicit with the svn model.

bzr does not branch implicitly, as far as I know, so I am not sure to 
understand how this could happen if you only track one branch (which is 
what most people who just want to get the sources would do). At least, 
things could be set up such as people do see only one branch by default. 
That's how bzr itself is developed, for example: I track the development 
branch for a long time, I never had to use any merge command. Only pull 
(that's something I forgot in my former email: there is a difference for 
commit vs commit + push, as well as for up vs pull).

> Once
> again, the tool is much more reliable than svn, and once you have
> understood it, its a breeze, with less bad surprises, but many people
> don't want to learn.

I guess my argument is the following: there are several groups of people 
who may be interested in the sources. It is as simple as svn for 
occasional contributors (people who get source, people who do a trivial 
patch), and it would be different for people who significantly 
contribute to one of the project. But I don't think this later group 
includes people who do not want to learn :)

cheers.

David