The Bazaar DVCS seems to be left far behind Git and Mercurial, at least in terms of adoption and overall mindshare in the VCS space. AFAIK the only high profile projects using bzr are Ubuntu and Launchpad, both directly backed by Canonical. So I'm wondering, would it make sense for Canonical to switch to one of the other two leading contenders instead of keep allocating resources to it ? Is there any strategic advantage, technical or otherwise, in pushing Bazaar at this time and age ?
2 Answers
I don't use Bazaar, but when I have to - however, in the spirit of open source bazaar fits the bill. In the viewpoint of Canonical, Git and other source control tools didn't cut it for them so they produced Bazaar which suites their needs to a T. Would I like them to switch to another VCS? Sure, but it's not likely to happen - preferred source control tools are always opinionated by design and none of them are perfect.
Bazaar has plenty of projects using it - Launchpad is not just one project, it's a collection of many projects - many of which utilize Bazaar as their source control.
Personally I don't like Bazaar - so for the projects I interact with I export the bazaar repository to Git then import my changes back in. The majority of all modern DVCS are inter-compatible to some extent (and most are compatible with SVN and other CVCS). So in the end each project will use what is best for it's team. Each developer will use whatever is best for them.
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1Git wasn't around when Bazaar was initially developed; according to Wikipedia all three DVCS appeared around the same time (early 2005). So it sure made sense back then to come up with something better than the existing tools but five years later the landscape has changed a lot. My question is whether there are still reasons other than the cost of switching for Canonical to keep developing Bazaar.– gsakkisOct 9, 2010 at 14:45
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Speaking as a long-term user of Bazaar ; it's rather easier on the uninitiated than Git is, has better GUI tools (as far as I can tell), supports CVCS-ish working as well as DVCS working. For a long time it worked better on Windows than Git did. It's also MUCH easier to hack on, being written in Python. It also does some things differently to Git - like explicitly tracking renames instead of guessing them algorithmically, which can either be a curse or a blessing. I am leaning toward Git now though.– AdrianAug 11, 2012 at 9:51
Sometimes, I find what VCS people use pushes away developers from contributing for small fixes since they aren't familiar with the particular VCS. It may not be true, but it has happened to be multiple times, where I want to contribute, but dont want to go through the hassle of trying to setup and use a new VCS. They would definitely be helped if they were to switch to a more widely used VCS, but if the one they are currently using fulfills all their needs i dont see them switching.
:)
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