git appraise

[Profpatsch]

https://github.com/google/git-appraise

Maybe relevant, seems to have a different goal.

[matthiasbeyer]

Yes, we saw that already and we think that it is nice, but it focuses on code review, not on issue tracking. And it stores data in JSON, afaik.
We have to think hard about whether we want such things (and we do not want JSON, that's clear).

[Profpatsch]

We have to think hard about whether we want such things (and we do not want JSON, that's clear).

I think the “empty commit” idea is the way to go.
Though the format of messages should be fixed a bit more, was thinking of using MIME, since that’s a very well-understood, widely implemented and extensible standard for messages.
It has lots of baggage, it should be possible to define a subset without all the legacy (e.g. specify UTF-8 as only valid encoding).

[matthiasbeyer]

I think that's basically what we do with the tags.

[Profpatsch]

Is it possible to add multiple files with mimetype? Is it possible to attach other messages? Are headers standardized (incl encoding)?

MIME does a lot more than a few headers. For mapping it to existing mail infrastructure, it will be vital to do all these things, so why not just go with the existing standard? Also there’s already very good support library-wise.

If you go with a manual format, you will

1. have to map
2. reinvent most of the standard (badly) either way over time

:)

[neithernut]

Good point.

However, I'd rather have files stored in the tree. It greatly simplifies accessing those files via regular git tools.
This is, of course, only possible as long as it doesn't conflict with other tree contents. However, I expect files to be only attached to bug-reports, maybe feature requests, but never to patch-sets.