Change the repository layout to that of a proper Vim plug-in

README.md

@@ -1,25 +1,41 @@
 # Miscellaneous auto-load Vim scripts
 
-The git repository at [github.com/xolox/vim-misc] [repository] contains Vim scripts that are used by most of the [Vim plug-ins I've written] [plugins] yet don't really belong with any single one. I include this repository as a subdirectory of my plug-in repositories using the following commands:
+The git repository at [github.com/xolox/vim-misc] [repository] contains Vim scripts that are used by most of the [Vim plug-ins I've written] [plugins] yet don't really belong with any single one of the plug-ins. Basically it's an extended standard library of Vim script functions that I wrote during the development of my Vim plug-ins.
 
-    $ git remote add -f vim-misc https://github.com/xolox/vim-misc.git
-    $ git merge -s ours --no-commit vim-misc/master
-    $ git read-tree --prefix=autoload/xolox/misc/ -u vim-misc/master
-    $ git commit -m "Merge vim-misc repository as subdirectory"
+The miscellaneous scripts are bundled with each of my plug-ins using git merges, so that a repository checkout of a plug-in contains everything that's needed to get started. This means the git repository of the miscellaneous scripts is only used to track changes in a central, public place.
 
-The above trick is called the [subtree merge strategy] [merge-strategy]. To update a plug-in repository to the latest version of the miscellaneous auto-load scripts I execute the following command:
+## How does it work?
 
-    $ git pull -s subtree vim-misc master
+Here's how I merge the miscellaneous scripts into a Vim plug-in repository:
+
+1. Let git know about the `vim-misc` repository by adding the remote GitHub repository:
+
+        git remote add -f vim-misc https://github.com/xolox/vim-misc.git
+
+2. Merge the two directory trees without clobbering the `README.md` and/or `.gitignore` files, thanks to the selected merge strategy and options:
+
+        git checkout master
+        git merge --no-commit -s recursive -X ours vim-misc/master
+        git commit -m "Merge vim-misc repository as overlay"
+
+3. While steps 1 and 2 need to be done only once for a given repository, the following commands are needed every time I want to pull and merge the latest changes:
+
+        git checkout master
+        git fetch vim-misc master
+        git merge --no-commit -s recursive -X ours vim-misc/master
+        git commit -m "Merged changes to miscellaneous scripts"
 
 ## Why make things so complex?
 
 I came up with this solution after multiple years of back and forth between Vim Online users, the GitHub crowd and my own sanity:
 
-1. When I started publishing my first Vim plug-ins I would prepare ZIP archives for Vim Online using makefiles. The makefiles would make sure the miscellaneous scripts were included in the uploaded distributions. This had two disadvantages: It lost git history and the repositories on GitHub were not usable out of the box, so [I got complaints from GitHub (Pathogen) users] [github-complaints].
+1. When I started publishing my first Vim plug-ins (in June 2010) I would prepare ZIP archives for Vim Online using makefiles. The makefiles would make sure the miscellaneous scripts were included in the uploaded distributions. This had two disadvantages: It lost git history and the repositories on GitHub were not usable out of the box, so [I got complaints from GitHub (Pathogen) users] [github-complaints].
+
+2. My second attempt to solve the problem used git submodules which seemed like the ideal solution until I actually started using them in March 2011: Submodules are not initialized during a normal `git clone`, you need to use `git clone --recursive` instead but Vim plug-in managers like [Pathogen] [pathogen] and [Vundle] [vundle] don't do this (at least [they didn't when I tried] [vundle-discussion]) so people would end up with broken checkouts.
 
-2. My second attempt to solve the problem used git submodules which seemed like the ideal solution until I actually started doing it. Submodules are not initialized during a normal `git clone`, you need to use `git clone --recursive` instead but Vim plug-in managers like [Pathogen] [pathogen] and [Vundle] [vundle] don't do this (at least [they didn't when I tried] [vundle-discussion]) so people would end up with broken checkouts.
+3. After finding out that git submodules were not going to solve my problems I searched for other inclusion strategies supported by git. After a while I came upon the [subtree merge strategy] [merge-strategy] which I started using in May 2011 and stuck with for more than two years (because it generally worked fine and seemed quite robust).
 
-3. After finding out that git submodules were not going to solve my problems I searched for other inclusion strategies supported by git. After a while I came upon the [subtree merge strategy] [merge-strategy] which I have been using for more than two years now.
+4. In April 2013 the flat layout of the repository started bothering me because it broke my personal workflow, so I changed it to the proper directory layout of a Vim plug-in. Why did it break my workflow? Because I couldn't get my [vim-reload] [reload] plug-in to properly reload miscellaneous scripts without nasty hacks. Note to self: [Dropbox does not respect symbolic links] [dropbox-vote-350] and Vim doesn't like them either ([E746] [E746]).
 
 ## Compatibility issues
 
@@ -39,11 +55,14 @@ This software is licensed under the [MIT license] [mit].
 © 2013 Peter Odding &lt;<peter@peterodding.com>&gt;.
 
 
+[dropbox-vote-350]: https://www.dropbox.com/votebox/350/preserve-implement-symlink-behaviour
+[E746]: http://vimdoc.sourceforge.net/htmldoc/eval.html#E746
 [github-complaints]: https://github.com/xolox/vim-easytags/issues/1
 [merge-strategy]: http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/howto/using-merge-subtree.html
 [mit]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License
 [pathogen]: http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=2332
 [plugins]: http://peterodding.com/code/vim/
+[reload]: http://peterodding.com/code/vim/reload
 [repository]: https://github.com/xolox/vim-misc
 [vundle-discussion]: https://github.com/gmarik/vundle/pull/41
 [vundle]: https://github.com/gmarik/vundle

path.vim → autoload/xolox/misc/path.vim

@@ -1,12 +1,13 @@
 " Vim auto-load script
 " Author: Peter Odding <peter@peterodding.com>
-" Last Change: April 18, 2013
+" Last Change: April 22, 2013
 " URL: http://peterodding.com/code/vim/misc/
 
 let s:windows_compatible = has('win32') || has('win64')
 let s:mac_os_x_compatible = has('macunix')
 
-function! xolox#misc#path#which(...)
+function! xolox#misc#path#which(...) " {{{1
+  " Scan the executable search path for programs.
   let extensions = s:windows_compatible ? split($PATHEXT, ';') : ['']
   let matches = []
   let checked = {}
@@ -29,9 +30,8 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#which(...)
   return matches
 endfunction
 
-" Split a pathname into a list of path components.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#split(path)
+function! xolox#misc#path#split(path) " {{{1
+  " Split a pathname into a list of path components.
   if type(a:path) == type('')
     if s:windows_compatible
       return split(a:path, '[\/]\+')
@@ -44,9 +44,8 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#split(path)
   return []
 endfunction
 
-" Join a list of path components into a pathname.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#join(parts)
+function! xolox#misc#path#join(parts) " {{{1
+  " Join a list of path components into a pathname.
   if type(a:parts) == type([])
     if !s:windows_compatible && a:parts[0] == '/'
       return join(a:parts, '/')[1 : -1]
@@ -57,9 +56,10 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#join(parts)
   return ''
 endfunction
 
-" Canonicalize and resolve a pathname.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#absolute(path)
+function! xolox#misc#path#absolute(path) " {{{1
+  " Canonicalize and resolve a pathname, regardless of whether it exists. This
+  " is intended to support string comparison to determine whether two pathnames
+  " point to the same directory or file.
   if type(a:path) == type('')
     let path = fnamemodify(a:path, ':p')
     " resolve() doesn't work when there's a trailing path separator.
@@ -77,9 +77,8 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#absolute(path)
   return ''
 endfunction
 
-" Make an absolute pathname relative.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#relative(path, base)
+function! xolox#misc#path#relative(path, base) " {{{1
+  " Make an absolute pathname relative.
   let path = xolox#misc#path#split(a:path)
   let base = xolox#misc#path#split(a:base)
   while path != [] && base != [] && path[0] == base[0]
@@ -90,9 +89,9 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#relative(path, base)
   return xolox#misc#path#join(distance + path)
 endfunction
 
-" Join a directory and filename into a single pathname.
 
-function! xolox#misc#path#merge(parent, child, ...)
+function! xolox#misc#path#merge(parent, child, ...) " {{{1
+  " Join a directory and filename into a single pathname.
   " TODO Use isabs()!
   if type(a:parent) == type('') && type(a:child) == type('')
     if s:windows_compatible
@@ -108,9 +107,8 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#merge(parent, child, ...)
   return ''
 endfunction
 
-" Find the common prefix of path components in a list of pathnames.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#commonprefix(paths)
+function! xolox#misc#path#commonprefix(paths) " {{{1
+  " Find the common prefix of path components in a list of pathnames.
   let common = xolox#misc#path#split(a:paths[0])
   for path in a:paths
     let index = 0
@@ -127,9 +125,8 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#commonprefix(paths)
   return xolox#misc#path#join(common)
 endfunction
 
-" Encode a pathname so it can be used as a filename.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#encode(path)
+function! xolox#misc#path#encode(path) " {{{1
+  " Encode a pathname so it can be used as a filename.
   if s:windows_compatible
     let mask = '[*|\\/:"<>?%]'
   elseif s:mac_os_x_compatible
@@ -140,12 +137,13 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#encode(path)
   return substitute(a:path, mask, '\=printf("%%%x", char2nr(submatch(0)))', 'g')
 endfunction
 
-" Decode a pathname previously encoded with xolox#misc#path#encode().
 
-function! xolox#misc#path#decode(encoded_path)
+function! xolox#misc#path#decode(encoded_path) " {{{1
+  " Decode a pathname previously encoded with xolox#misc#path#encode().
   return substitute(a:encoded_path, '%\(\x\x\?\)', '\=nr2char("0x" . submatch(1))', 'g')
 endfunction
 
+" xolox#misc#path#equals(a, b) {{{1
 " Check whether two pathnames point to the same file.
 
 if s:windows_compatible
@@ -158,9 +156,8 @@ else
   endfunction
 endif
 
-" Check whether a path is relative.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#is_relative(path)
+function! xolox#misc#path#is_relative(path) " {{{1
+  " Check whether a path is relative.
   if a:path =~ '^\w\+://'
     return 0
   elseif s:windows_compatible
@@ -170,9 +167,8 @@ function! xolox#misc#path#is_relative(path)
   endif
 endfunction
 
-" Create a temporary directory and return the path.
-
-function! xolox#misc#path#tempdir()
+function! xolox#misc#path#tempdir() " {{{1
+  " Create a temporary directory and return the path.
   if !exists('s:tempdir_counter')
     let s:tempdir_counter = 1
   endif