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dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <html>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <head>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <title>Fossil - Principles of Operation</title>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: </head>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <body bgcolor="white">
469002ccdf 2007-09-12       aku: <p>[ <a href="index.html">Index</a> ]</p>
469002ccdf 2007-09-12       aku: <hr>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <h1>Principles Of Operation</h1>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <p>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: This page attempts to define the foundational principals upon
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: which Fossil is built.
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: </p>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <ul>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <li><p>A project consists of source files, wiki pages, and
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: trouble tickets.  All historical copies of all these
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: entities are saved.  The project maintains an audit
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: trail.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <li><p>A project resides in one or more repositories.  Each
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: repository is administered and operates independently
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: of the others.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <li><p>Each repository has both global and local state.  The
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: global state is common to all repositories (or at least
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: has the potential to be shared in common when the
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: repositories are fully synchronized).  The local state
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: for each repository is private to that repository.
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: The global state represents the content of the project.
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: The local state identifies the authorized users and
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: access policies for a particular repository.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: <li><p>The global state of a repository is an unordered
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: collection of files.  Each file is named by
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: its SHA1 hash encoded in hexadecimal.
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: In many contexts, the name can be
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: abbreviated to a unique prefix.  A five- or six-character
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: prefix usually suffices to uniquely identify a file.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: <li><p>Because files are named by their SHA1 hash, all files
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: are immutable.  Any change to the content of a file also
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: changes the hash that forms the files name, thus
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: creating a new file.  Both the old original version of the
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: file and the new change are preserved under different names.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <li><p>It is theoretically possible for two files with different
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: content to share the same hash.  But finding two such
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: files is so incredibly difficult and unlikely that we
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: consider it to be an impossibility.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: <li><p>The signature of a file is the SHA1 hash of the
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: file itself, exactly as it appears on disk.  No prefix
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: or meta-information about the file is added before computing
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: the hash.  So you can
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: always find the SHA1 signature of a file by using the
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: "sha1sum" command-line utility.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: <li><p>The files that comprise the global state of a repository
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: are the complete global state of that repository.  The SQLite
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: database that holds the repository contains additional information
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: about linkages between files, but all of that added information
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: can be discarded and reconstructed by rescanning the content
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: files.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: <li><p>Two repositories for the same project can synchronize
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: their global states simply by sharing files.  The local
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: state of repositories is not normally synchronized or
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: shared.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: <li><p>Every repository has a special file at the top-level
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: named "manifest" which is an index of all other files in
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: the system.  The manifest is automatically created and
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: maintained by the system.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
b110d77c36 2007-08-09       drh: <li><p>The <a href="fileformat.html">file formats</a>
b110d77c36 2007-08-09       drh: used by Fossil are all very simple so that with access
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: to the original content files, one can easily reconstruct
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: the content of a baseline without the need for any
b807acf62e 2007-07-24       drh: special tools or software.</p></li>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: 
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: </body>
dbda8d6ce9 2007-07-21       drh: </html>