Re: ChangeLog

[Oliver Kiddle <opk@xxxxxxx>]

Bart Schaefer wrote:
> Yes it does.  It's often the only place that the actual contributor of
> a patch is recorded when someone else does the git commit.

Everyone, including you, has been using --author to helpfully record the
contributor in the git history. Or perhaps you're using git am on the
mailbox file which also works. The committer is also recorded.

> I also find it easier to search for a change and for what version it
> appeared, than to do so using the git log.

While I've never much liked the default format generated by git log it
does have options that help with searching for changes. And there are
other tools for searching like git-blame. Or the output format can be
configured in a git alias.

This is a fairly marginal benefit compared to the hassle of merging
ChangeLog entries when cherry-picking changes. I've often hit conflicts
on the ChangeLog even without ever being involved in doing releases.
We could include a script for generating the ChangeLog from the git
history. This would only need to be run when a release is done for
inclusion in release tarballs but would be available for anyone who
simply prefers the format it generates. And I would view it as a good
thing if we make it easier for minor releases to be created.

Oliver