converting the vlc packaging branch to git

[Reinhard Tartler]

Hello Team, Hi Christophe,

So we have decided on using git, and I'm really keen on using it. I'd
like to start with the vlc package because of the following reasons:

 - very active upstream
 - upstream is using git themselves
 - xtophe is both (active) team member and upstream. And does know git
 - we have a non-trivial svn history of the vlc packaging.
 - there already exists an ubuntu package in bzr, which I'd like to get
   rid of by using a branch in git.

But now how to convert the svn mess? I'd love to have the following
properties:

 - an "upstream branch" and tarball creation with pristine-tar
 - the "upstream branch" should share the history of 
   git://git.videolan.org/vlc.git
 - the "debian" branch should contain the exact state of what the
   buildds are seeing. This means full source including the debian
   directory 
 - git history resembling the debian upload history
 - git tags representing historical uploads to debian (and ubuntu)

I consider the last 2 points as rather important. In the past we had
troubles like this (not in vlc, but e.g. in ffmpeg): 

  - debian freezes, development continues in experimental
  - RC bug (security) is filed against the unstable branch
  - development on the unstable branch has to continue.

This is possible in svn, and I do not want to loose that with the
conversion. I'd really want to to able branch from the package that is
currently in 'stable' (aka etch), and ideally also from what is in
'oldstable' (aka 'sarge').

What I have tried:

git clone git://git.videolan.org/vlc.git vlc-upstream
git-svn clone svn+ssh://svn.debian.org/svn/pkg-multimedia/experimental/vlc
cd vlc && git pull ../vlc


This sort-of worked, however I still have not the two last properties:
the history is not interleaved and I don't have the tags representing
the debian uploads.

Does some git guru have a clue how to do the conversion in a sane way?



-- 
Gruesse/greetings,
Reinhard Tartler, KeyID 945348A4