On Thursday 22 May 2008 4:28:29 am Jecel Assumpcao Jr wrote:
> Our sources are the .image files. It isn't what people are used to, but
> that doesn't make it less true.
From the tone of the email, it looks as if Debian maintainer is just trying to 
understand images and figure out how to handle images in their current 
version control process.  Text-based tools like texteditor, cmp, diff, patch 
etc.used in version control will not work with images. A Squeak image is not 
a 'source' but records the entire state of a virtual machine. In a way, it is 
like firmware to configure wireless devices or codecs required to interpret 
certain audio/video files. VM mimics a virtual device and image is 
its 'firmware'.

The issues are:

1. How does one compare two images A and B are equal?
2. If A and B are not equal, how to extract the patch which produced B from A?
3. How does one compare two patch set to see if they are equal?
4. Given an image A and a series of patches P1..PN, can different people apply 
them in a sequence to produce the 'same' image, B.
5. Is an image file specific to an architecture or not (answer: not)

I remember 1) was discussed in this mailing list sometime back but don't 
recollect a solution emerging from the discussions.

Subbu