The problem with externals is when you start moving and renaming stuff
in subversion.  When we did a massive reorg everything started to
break.  The svn externals point to the same location even after you do
an svn move.  That makes sense since they're not smart enough to know
how to change themselves.

So it becomes a maintenance nightmare as the number of tagged versions
and branches starts to grow.  Also, it can introduce even  subtler
problems if the external still results in code that compiles but its
not the expected code.

We only have one external now which is current.  Current is just for
convenience sake and if it breaks, it doesn't prevent you from
building the intended code.

Sean

On 8/10/06, Mike Kienenberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
While there was a lot of talk about disliking externals, here is the
only thing I found that gave any reasons:



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Sean Schofield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Jan 1, 2006 10:35 PM
Subject: Re: Maven Build (Ongoing Work Thread)
To: MyFaces Development <[email protected]>

[...]

I wonder if there is an easy way to share website resources in maven?
I don't think we should have 10 copies of the stylesheets, etc. per
project.  We can use externals but I hesitate to do that b/c they are
a PITA when you are branching and tagging (the externals don't change
automatically - you have to change them all manually.)

Sean

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