Lazarus setup with version control

[Cascade]

I’d like to use FPCUpDeluxe to manage my Lazarus + FPC installation (typically the Fixes branches, 3 cross-compilers and a few modules), but at the same time be able to have that installation under version control, so I can manage any modifications I make to the IDE, make/submit patches etc.  Essentially an FPCUpDeluxe installation where I can contribute as well as use Lazarus for software development.

Not sure what a practical setup / workflow would look like.  How best to achieve this?

[Thaddy]

If you have an account, try https://github.com/GitJournal/git-auto-sync
That's what I use.
It is by no means ideal, you have to get used to it.
But when it runs, it does the job.

[ALLIGATOR]

I'm not sure if I understand you correctly.
This is what I do:
1. First, I let FPCUpDeluxe download and prepare everything. Once, during the first launch.
2. Then I switch to “Build only” in its settings.
3. After that, I manage the FPC and Lazarus repositories (in the directory I specified during FPCUpDeluxe setup) manually—I make changes, fetch, pull, rebase.
4. And then I just compile again through FPCUpDeluxe. (Since I had already enabled “Build only” in its settings, it does not try to overwrite my changes.)

[Cascade]

Thank you Thaddy and Alligator.  I'll take a look at git-auto-sync.

Then I switch to “Build only” in its settings.

That might be the bit I was missing!  So I manage any changes I make to my local IDE manually (e.g. create local branches in something like GitHub Desktop) - that makes sense.  At some later point in time I'm then likely to want FpcUpDeluxe to fetch and update me with the latest Lazarus Fixes.  So I'd switch off "Build only" temporarily for that ...can I then reapply my local changes afterwards (assuming they're compatible with whatever has been updated in Fixes) ?

[ALLIGATOR]

I don't know, this needs to be tested. How exactly FPCUpDeluxe manages files in the repository. But it's likely that it uses git and some kind of non-destructive method, so most likely, if the changes were committed to git, then it's possible. But I repeat, this is just my assumption of reasonable behavior, as I don't actually know.

After the first build through FPCUpDeluxe, I switch completely to manual repository management. So far, everything has worked out, although I don't experiment that much.

[Cascade]

Thanks - I'll give it a try.