-Xignore-all-space not respected

[borisbrodski]

First of all, thank you for this awesome project!

We are using it for a quite a bit. It works flowerless with the exception of just one issue:

If we merge with

$ git merge -Xignore-all-space other-branch

the pom.xml files, that get processed my the pomutils merge engine get conflicts,
if they contain differences in space/tab indentation.

Put it simple, the -Xignore-all-space git merge flag doesn't get respected for the files, on which pomutils was involved.

• Are there a trick to avoid it?

I'm looking into implementing an additional switch, like --expandtab 4, that will convert all tabs into 4 spaces in both files before exiting.

• Do you have better suggestions?
• Are you interested in a push request?

[cecom]

Hi,

i had a quick look and it is not that easy. We only adjust the pom version value element, regardless of the position on the line.

Example:
branch1: <version>1.0</version>
branch2: ....<version>2.0</version> (where dots are spaces)

If you do a branch 2 --> branch1 merge, the result (before the real merge happens) will be:

• if "our" strategie is used <version>1.0</version>
• if "their" strategie is used <version>2.0</version>

If you do a branch 1 --> branch2 merge, the result (before the real merge happens) will be:

• if "our" strategie is used ....<version>2.0</version> (where dots are spaces)
• if "their" strategie is used ....<version>1.0</version> (where dots are spaces)

After we adjusted the value, we call the git merge driver git merge-file ... and this does not have any options like ignore-all-space.

I need to think about it a little bit more, if there is a solution....

[borisbrodski]

Thank you for the quick response. I also couldn't find a simple solution to the missing --ignore-all-space switch. One complicated solution may be:

• create a new temporary directory and git init there
• Add base-file to a repo and commit it
• Create branch1, add current-file and commit it
• Create branch2 on the base commit, add other-file and commit it
• Issue git merge branch1 -Xignore-all-space
• Grab the merged file
• Remove temporery directory

---

But if you would consider a simpler problem, like just confused tabs and spaces, the solution may be also much simpler. For example:

• branch1: \t<version>1.0</version> (where \t is the tab)
• branch2: ....<version>2.0</version> (where dots are spaces)

you may just come away with the simple TAB -> SPACE replacement. I already tested it by adding

• --expandtab=<count-of-spaces>

option to the pomutils, that just replaces all TABs in

• current
• base
• other

by 4 spaces (in my example). This solves my current problem. Of course, if TABs doesn't exactly match SPACES, this will fail as you have described.

[cecom]

The problem on your first solution is, that would happen for all poms. So if you have a multi module project with 100 of poms that could take a while, because it would be done for every single pom.

Your Second solution does not work, because i dont have access to the real pom file. I manipulate the file via the maven-version-plugin classes and they dont provide any access to the real file.

Update: For your second solution, i only want to update the line where the version "problem" exists. But you meant to replace all \t in the complete file, correct?

[borisbrodski]

Yes, I replace all \t into spaces. This already works here. Do you find it wrong to replace all \t ?

And yes, the performance will be definitely the problem. On the other hand, solving conflicts manually is always longer, that any automated procedure. Also I would not use this first complex solution by default.

[cecom]

If there is no solution on your side (get a xml formatter for every developer so the pom.xml file is always correct formatted), then the way i would go would be:

• add a property ala "preFormatXml" which defaults to "false"
• if true, before we do anyhing with the pom, we format the complete pom with the formatter, so everything is alined after a template
• after that we do our merge stuff.

That would solve \t and space issues. But im a litte bit unsure. There could also be some formatting changes in your pom, which you dont want...

[borisbrodski]

Thank you!

This is working great so far. Instead of full format, I am just replacing tabs with spaces.

[cecom]

so you changed your developers format rules and the problem does not exist anymore? So we can close this issue?

[borisbrodski]

No, I extended pomutils to simply replace all tabs with spaces before passing files to the git merge.

[cecom]

Ok, than send me a pull request and i will have a look. Plz add a test too. Have a look at my other tests, its easy to add them.

[cecom]

@borisbrodski are you working on it anymore? Or can i close this ticket?

[borisbrodski]

Thank you for reminding me of this issue. I will add some tests and create a pull request.

[borisbrodski]

Please, check the pull request :)

[cecom]

Hi Boris,

i had a look. What do you think, if i would change it to "Tabify" and "Untabify"? So we can get both worlds? The one who uses TABs can use the tabify and one who uses Spaces uses the Untabify. I would take your Code and change it a little bit :-)