man > cvsps(1)

cvsps(1)                               General Commands Manual                              cvsps(1)

NAME
       CVSps - create patchset information from CVS

SYNOPSIS
       cvsps  [-h]  [-x] [-u] [-z <fuzz>] [-g] [-s <patchset>] [-a <author>] [-f <file>] [-d <date1>
       [-d <date2>]] [-l <text>] [-b <branch>] [-r <tag> [-r  <tag>]]  [-p  <directory>]  [-v]  [-t]
       [--norc] [--summary-first] [--test-log <filename>] [--bkcvs] [--no-rlog] [--diff-opts <option
       string>]  [--cvs-direct]  [--debuglvl  <bitmask>]  [-Z <compression>] [--root <cvsroot>] [-q]
       [-A] [<repository>]

DESCRIPTION
       CVSps is a program for generating 'patchset' information from a CVS repository.   A  patchset
       in  this case is defined as a set of changes made to a collection of files, and all committed
       at the same time (using a single 'cvs commit' command).  This information is valuable to see‐
       ing the big picture of the evolution of a cvs project.  While cvs  tracks  revision  informa‐
       tion,  it  is  often difficult to see what changes were committed 'atomically' to the reposi‐
       tory.

OPTIONS
       -h     display usage summary

       -x     ignore (and rebuild) ~/.cvsps/cvsps.cache file

       -u     update ~/.cvsps/cvsps.cache file

       -z <fuzz>
              set the timestamp fuzz factor for identifying patch sets

       -g     generate diffs of the selected patch sets

       -s <patchset>[-[<patchset>]][,<patchset>...]
              generate a diff for a given patchsets and patchset ranges

       -a <author>
              restrict output to patchsets created by author

       -f <file>
              restrict output to patchsets involving file

       -d <date1> -d <date2>
              if just one date specified, show revisions newer than date1.  If two dates  specified,
              show revisions between two dates.

       -l <regex>
              restrict output to patchsets matching regex in log message

       -b <branch>
              restrict  output to patchsets affecting history of branch.  If you want to restrict to
              the main branch, use a branch of 'HEAD'.

       -r <tag1> -r <tag2>
              if just one tag specified, show revisions since tag1. If two tags specified, show  re‐
              visions between the two tags.

       -p <dir>
              output individual patchsets as files in <dir> as <dir>/<patchset>.patch

       -v     show very verbose parsing messages

       -t     show some brief memory usage statistics

       --norc when invoking cvs, ignore the .cvsrc file

       --summary-first
              when  multiple  patchset  diffs  are being generated, put the patchset summary for all
              patchsets at the beginning of the output.

       --test-log <captured cvs log file>
              for testing changes, you can capture cvs log output, then test against  this  captured
              file instead of hammering some poor CVS server

       --bkcvs
              (see  note  below) for use in parsing the BK->CVS tree log formats only.  This enables
              some hacks which are not generally applicable.

       --no-rlog
              disable the use of rlog internally.  Note: rlog is required for stable  PatchSet  num‐
              bering.  Use with care.

       --diff-opts <option string>
              send  a  custom  set of options to diff, for example to increase the number of context
              lines, or change the diff format.

       --cvs-direct (--no-cvs-direct)
              enable (disable) built-in cvs client code. This enables the 'pipelining'  of  multiple
              requests over a single client, reducing the overhead of handshaking and authentication
              to one per PatchSet instead of one per file.

       --debuglvl <bitmask>
              enable various debug output channels.

       -Z <compression>
              A value 1-9 which specifies amount of compression.  A value of 0 disables compression.

       --root <cvsroot>
              Override  the setting of CVSROOT (overrides working dir. and environment).  For --cvs-
              direct only.

       -q     Be quiet about warnings.  -A Show ancestor branch when a new branch is found.

       <repository>
              Operate on the specified repository (overrides working dir.)

NOTE ON TAG HANDLING
       Tags are fundamentally 'file at a time' in cvs, but like everything else, it would be nice to
       imagine that they are 'repository at a time.'  The approach cvsps takes is that a tag is  as‐
       signed  to  a  patchset.   The meaning of this is that after this patchset, every revision of
       every file is after the tag (and conversely, before this patchset, at least one file is still
       before the tag).  However, there are two kinds of inconsistent (or 'funky') tags that can  be
       created, even when following best practices for cvs.

       The  first is what is called a FUNKY tag.  A funky tag is one where there are patchsets which
       are chronologically (and thus by patchset id) earlier than the tag, but  are  tagwise  after.
       These  tags  will  be  marked as '**FUNKY**' in the Tag: section of the cvsps output.  When a
       funky tag is specified as one of the '-r' arguments, there are some number of patchsets which
       need to be considered out of sequence.  In this case, the patchsets themselves  will  be  la‐
       beled FUNKY and will be processed correctly.

       The second is called an INVALID tag.  An invalid tag is a tag where there are patchsets which
       are  chronologically  (and  thus by patchset id) earlier than the tag, but which have members
       which are tagwise both before, and after the tag, in the same patchset.  If an INVALID tag is
       specified as one of the '-r' arguments, cvsps will flag each member of the affected patchsets
       as before or after the tag and the patchset summary will indicate which  members  are  which,
       and diffs will be generated accordingly.

NOTE ON CVS VERSIONS
       Among the different cvs subcommands used by cvsps is the 'rlog' command.  The rlog command is
       used  to  get  revision history of a module, and it disregards the current working directory.
       The important difference between 'rlog' and 'log' (from cvsps perspective) is the 'rlog' will
       include log data for files not in the current working  directory.   The  impact  of  this  is
       mainly  when  there  are directories which at one time had files, but are now empty, and have
       been pruned from the working directory with the '-P' option.  If 'rlog' is  not  used,  these
       files logs will not be parsed, and the PatchSet numbering will be unstable.

       The  main  problem with 'rlog' is that, until cvs version 1.11.1, 'rlog' was an alias for the
       'log' command.  This means, for old versions of cvs, 'rlog' has different semantics  and  us‐
       age.   cvsps  will  attempt to work around this problem by detecting capable versions of cvs.
       If an old version is detected, 'log' will be used instead of 'rlog', and YMMV.

NOTE ON GENERATED DIFFS
       Another important note is that cvsps will attempt, whenever possible, to use  the  r-commands
       (rlog,  rdiff  and co) instead of the local commands (log, diff, and update).  This is to al‐
       low cvsps to function without a completely checked out tree.  Because  these  r-commands  are
       used, the generated diffs will include the module directory in them, and it is recommended to
       apply  them  in  the working directory with the -p1 option to the patch command.  However, if
       the --diff-opts option is specified (to change, for example,  the  lines  of  context),  then
       rdiff  cannot  be  used,  because  it  doesn't  support arbitrary options.  In this case, the
       patches will be generated without the module directory in the path, and -p0 will be  required
       when  applying  the patch.  When diffs are generated in cvs-direct mode (see below), however,
       they will always be -p1 style patches.

NOTE ON BKCVS
       The --bkcvs option is a special operating mode that should only be used when parsing the  log
       files  from  the  BK  ->  CVS  exported linux kernel trees.  cvsps uses special semantics for
       recreating the BK ChangeSet metadata that has been embedded in the log files for those trees.
       The --bkcvs option should only be specified when the cache file is being created  or  updated
       (i.e. initial run of cvsps, or when -u and -x options are used).

NOTE ON CVS-DIRECT
       As of version 2.0b6 cvsps has a partial implementation of the cvs client code built in.  This
       reduces the RTT and/or handshaking overhead from one per patchset member to one per patchset.
       This  dramatically increases the speed of generating diffs over a slow link, and improves the
       consistency of operation.  Currently the --cvs-direct option turns on the use of  this  code,
       but it very well may be default by the time 2.0 comes out.  The built-in cvs code attempts to
       be  compatible  with  cvs,  but  may  have problems, which should be reported.  It honors the
       CVS_RSH and CVS_SERVER environment variables, but does not parse the ~/.cvsrc file.

NOTE ON CVSPS RC FILE
       CVSps parses an rc file at startup.  This file should be located  in  ~/.cvsps/cvspsrc.   The
       file  should contain arguments, in the exact syntax as the command line, one per line.  If an
       argument takes a parameter, the parameter should be on the same line as the argument.

NOTE ON DATE FORMATS
       All dates are reported in localtime.  This can be overridden (as usual) using the TZ environ‐
       ment variable.  Dates as arguments must be in the format 'yyyy/mm/dd hh:mm:ss'; for example,

           $ cvsps -d '2004/05/01 00:00:00' -d '2004/07/07 12:00:00'

SEE ALSO
       cvs(1), ci(1), co(1), cvs(5), cvsbug(8), diff(1), grep(1), patch(1), rcs(1), rcsdiff(1),  rc‐
       smerge(1), rlog(1).

REPORTING BUGS
       Report bugs to "David Mansfield <cvsps AT dm.com>"

BUGS
       No known bugs.


                                                                                            cvsps(1)