Treatment of git in the build environment

[Audioniek]

Over time I have noted three different approaches to content fetched from a git in the build environment:

1. Check for an unpacked git in a directory in ~/Archive, if not there pull git
2. Always pull the latest version and build from that, overwriting/updating the directory in ~/Archive
3. Ask the user which revision to build from (e.g. with OpenPLi. but neutrinos and tvheadend all use method 2.)

There are advantages and disadvantages with each option:
1: + always builds builds succesfully, even with patches
- never updates to a newer version unless the user intervenes by deleting the corresponding directory in ~/Archive
2: + always builds with the latest version
- After changes in the git, patches may fail
3: + total control
- When patching is needed, needs a separate patch for each revision supported
- Build process becomes interactive at some point (with OpenPLi)

I find this approach a bit inconsistent and it is my opinion that approach 1 is not the way to go.

A example containing all three cases is the file enigma2-pli-nightly.mk.

There two cases of 3. and these are different too. The kernel patch level is controlled as a build option asked for in make.sh , but the OpenPLi diff is asked during the build process. Asking the OpenPLi revision in make.sh would be more logical I think.

I start this thread to provoke some thoughts about this aspect and to make the environment more unified in this respect. My preference would be to change all instances of 1. into 2. and ask the OpenPLi revision in make.sh.

Regards,

Audioniek.