multiple working dirs from one repo

[Mads Kiilerich]

(Adam, your mail program is broken. It sends long lines without allowing 
the client to reflow them. And please quote the part you are responding to.)

On 07/21/2010 10:51 AM, Adam Downer wrote:
> So it would seem that this is not supported by mercurial without a juggling act
> of shelving patches / managing queues.

Could you please summarize what "this" is? What is your real problem? 
You have been giving several answers that you seem to have ignored. I 
don't understand what it is you think isn't supported by Mercurial.

It seems to me like you are asking for a way to juggle with patches. 
Mercurial allows you to juggle. What is the problem?

> This is a power that other tools, dare I say it, like SVN has and I know the
> underlying model is totally different but you can easily have multiple working
> copies from different branches even if they are just for reference purposes.

You can do that with Mercurial too. The simplest way is to create 
clones. The slightly more complex way is to use the Share extension.

But if you need the extra branches for reference purpose only then you 
might find that hgweb or tortoisehg solves most of your needs.

> So instead of just 'svn co http://repo/branches/blah'. I would have to shelve
> my changes I am currently working or or mq them, being careful to ensure that
> items I had not added to source control yet are handled. Then switch branches
> on my working copy maybe just to fix a trivial issue. Then reverse the whole
> process to return to my other work.

Mercurial can change (update) to other branches in working directory 
just as well as svn can. Just like with svn you _can_ have uncommitted 
changes in your working directory while you are updating, but if there 
has been made conflicting changes you might get in deep trouble.

> The other alternative is to do another clone of my local repo and switch that
> to the required branch, but this has some potential flaws which I am yet to
> research like hard link functionality on windowsXP (something I am yet to see
> work).

Hard links on windows should work just fine.

> I have read threads on sharing the local repos store (the sharing extension,
> etc.) and it seems like the potential is there to support this sharing as a
> feature if it can be agreed what should happen when functions like rollback are
> invoked.

Would the share extension solve your problem?

But you have one problem with it? Then let's discuss that instead of 
talking about Mercurial can't do what you need.

/Mads