From owner-freebsd-hackers Tue Dec 15 13:29:39 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id NAA28390 for freebsd-hackers-outgoing; Tue, 15 Dec 1998 13:29:39 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from wall.polstra.com (rtrwan160.accessone.com [206.213.115.74]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id NAA28385 for ; Tue, 15 Dec 1998 13:29:37 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from jdp@polstra.com) Received: from vashon.polstra.com (vashon.polstra.com [206.213.73.13]) by wall.polstra.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA06335; Tue, 15 Dec 1998 13:29:32 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from jdp@polstra.com) Received: (from jdp@localhost) by vashon.polstra.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA17235; Tue, 15 Dec 1998 13:29:31 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from jdp@polstra.com) Message-ID: X-Mailer: XFMail 1.3 [p0] on FreeBSD X-Priority: 3 (Normal) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <199812151811.KAA56534@apollo.backplane.com> Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 13:29:30 -0800 (PST) Organization: Polstra & Co., Inc. From: John Polstra To: Matthew Dillon Subject: Re: idea/help w. mirroring Cc: hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On 15-Dec-98 Matthew Dillon wrote: > Hmmm. At BEST, we do a sort of stacking. We break the CVS > tree out into a source tree on a read-only partition. We > then construct /usr/src by 'layering' it over the read-only > source tree by reconstructing the directory structure in a > r+w partition and making each source file a softlink to the > read-only 'backing store'. > > When we need to make a local hack, we break the softlink. When > we update the underlying source, we diff any broken softlinks > and fold in changes as appropriate. It aint perfect, but > it allows us to maintain local hacks while simultaniously > preventing us from accidently corrupting the source tree. I'm curious -- have you tried amd's "union" filesystem type? It tries to automate what you're doing. I've played around with it a little bit, but haven't attempted to use it on a large scale. John --- John Polstra jdp@polstra.com John D. Polstra & Co., Inc. Seattle, Washington USA "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." -- H. L. Mencken To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message