Provided by: atfs_1.4pl6-13_amd64 
NAME
vbind - bind name to version
SYNOPSIS
vbind [ options ] filenames ..
General version binding options:
[ -bind version binding ] [ -before baseline ] [ -since baseline ] [ -last ] [ -lastsaved ]
[ -uniq ] [ -nonuniq ] [ -rule rulebody | rulename ] [ -rulefile filename ] [ -trace ]
vbind command specific options:
[ -? (or -help) ] [ -alias version alias ] [ -date date ] [ -vnum version number ] [ -nomsg ]
[ -ruledump ] [ -ruleerr ] [ -rulelist ] [ -ruletest ] [ -version ]
OVERVIEW
This manual page describes the ShapeTools Version Binding mechanism, available in most commands of the
toolkit. The general version binding options described on this page are available in many commands such
like vl(1), vcat(1), vadm(1), save(1) and retrv(1) (just to name the most important ones). The vbind
command specific options are private to the vbind command (see below).
Version binding is the process of selecting one or more versions from a filenames history in order to
provides access to these version(s). This is conducted by version bind directives (or just version
bindings), which may be one of the following:
version numbers
"1.2" (version), "1." (generation), ".2" (revision)
version alias names
"ShapeTools-1.4", or "AtFS-2.0"
Version alias names are symbolic names tagged to single versions. They must be unique
throughout a history.
date specifications
"10.2.93" or "4.3." (European), "Feb 10, 1993" or "Mar 4{ (American)
A date may additionally contain a time in the form hh:mm or hh:mm:ss. See sttime(3) for a
complete list of recognized date formats.
bind rule names
"most_recent:" (plain), "from_release(VC-4.0):" (with argument)
The colon is not part of the rule name. See the bindrules(7) manual page for a description
on how to define version bind rules.
By default, version binding selects all versions fulfilling the given version bind requirements. The
-uniq option changes this behavior and treats only unique identification as success. With this option
given, version bind ignores all histories with more than one selected version. The -last and -lastsaved
options unify a non unique selection by choosing the last version (modification/saving time) or the last
saved version (saving time) from the bind hit set of each name.
The file $SHAPETOOLS/lib/shape/BindRules contains predefined rules for various cases. You may also define
your own rule file and invoke this by either the -rulefile option or by extending the search space
defined by the SHAPETOOLS environment variable. For information on how to write version bind rules, see
the bindrules(7) manual page.
VERSION BINDING IN ACTION
Version bind directives can be given either in brackets, directly following the name to be bound, or as
option arguments. Options may be user to set version bindings to be applied to all name arguments (-bind
and -rule options) or to define version ranges (-since and -before options).
Version identification by version number or version alias either results in a unique selection or fails,
when no appropriate version was found.
foo[1.2] Identifies a specific version by it's version number.
foo[release-2] Is interpreted as identification by version alias name.
Version identification by date selects the versions from a history that have been the most recently saved
versions at the given date. Identification by date may lead to multiple versions when development work in
multiple generations happened simultaneously at the given date. Vbind understands various date formats
such as in the list below. The sttime(3) manual page lists all recognized date formats.
foo[Jan 31, 1992]
foo[92/01/31]
foo[10.5.92 7:00:00]
Version bind rules describe general version binding policies. They are usually not dependent on
particular file histories and may be applied to all histories. Version bind rules may have arguments
enclosed in parentheses following the name.
foo[bind_rule:]
foo[bind_rule(arg1,arg2,...argN):]
When the colon at the end of the rule name in brackets is omitted, vbind first interprets the given
string as version alias. When no version with this alias name was found, vbind treats the string as rule
name and gives it a second try.
Plain filenames are those not followed by any version bind directive in square brackets. Without a rule
given with the -rule option on the command line, plain filenames are bound using the default version bind
rule. It selects the busy version if there is one, or the most recent non busy version otherwise.
eq (state, busy); max (version).
The default version binding may also be indicated by an empty pair of brackets: foo[]
NAME PATTERNS
The ShapeTools version binding mechanism performs filename substitution for given name patterns similar
to sh(1). This is necessary, as shell filename substitution does not recognize the names of saved
versions. Magic cookies are are:
* matching any string, including the empty string,
? matching any single character,
[c...] matching any one of the characters enclosed in the square brackets,
[l-r] matching any character lexically between the left (l) and the right (r) character, inclusive, and
[!c...]
[!l-r] matching any character not recognized by their counterparts above.
As square brackets on the command line may either be part of a pattern (e.g. *.[ch]) or a version binding
(e.g. *[release-2]), this may lead to some confusion. The leftmost pair of brackets is always interpreted
as version binding. Hence, in the first case, the string will be misinterpreted and you must add an
explicit version binding to avoid this (e.g. *.[ch][], default version binding added).
GENERAL VERSION BINDING OPTIONS
-before baseline
Define the lower boundary of a time interval for selecting all versions evolved in this interval.
Baseline can be any version bind directive uniquely selecting a version (e.g. version number,
version alias, or date). The saving date of the baseline version is the interval start time. The
boundary version (exactly matching the time given) is not included in the result set.
-bind version binding
Use version binding for binding each name on the command line, that has no explicit version
binding in brackets.
-last Select the last (modification/saving time) version of each nonunique selection. This causes the
resulting version list to contain at most one version of each history. -last may be combined with
other version bindings.
-lastsaved
Like -last, but busy versions are ignored.
-nonuniq
Force non-unique version identification. This option can be used to swich off the default behavior
of some commands (e.g. vadm) that suggests unique version identification.
-rule rulename | rulebody
With a name argument, this option sets the named rule as default rule for binding all names on the
command line. Alternatively, a rule body (a version selection rule without a name) may be given as
argument, which will be evaluated for each name on the command line. This option disables any
previous -bind or -rule definition. It does not affect names with a version binding in brackets.
-rulefile filename
Read in the named rule file and add all contained rules to the list of known rules. A syntactical
error, detected while parsing a rule causes the according rule to be skipped. Use vbind(1) with
the -ruleerr option for inspecting bind rule files. Multiple rule files may be specified on the
command line.
-since baseline
Define the upper boundary of a time interval for selecting all versions evolved in this interval.
Baseline can be any version bind directive uniquely selecting a version (e.g. version number,
version alias, or date. The saving date of the baseline version is the interval end time. The
boundary version (exactly matching the time given) is not included in the result set.
-trace Trace the evaluation. Each evaluated predicate is reported to standard output. Additionally, the
set of versions fulfilling the expressed (the hits set) is displayed after evaluation of each
predicate.
-uniq Require unique version identification. All history names on the command line, where multiple
versions meet the version bind requirements are ignored.
THE VBIND COMMAND
Vbind performs a version binding and returns a bound filename for each selected version. A bound filename
is a filename followed by a version number enclosed in brackets (e.g. foo[1.2]).
-?, -help
Display a short usage description.
-alias version alias
Use version alias for binding all names on the command line. This disables any previous -alias,
-bind, -date, -rule or -vnum definition. It does not affect names in pseudo bound version
notation.
-date date
Use date for binding all names occurring on the command line. This disables any previous -alias,
-bind, date, -rule or -vnum definition. It does not affect names in pseudo bound version
notation.
-nomsgSuppress output produced by version bind rules.
-ruledump
The -ruledump option causes all known version bind rules to be written to standard output. The
generated output contains all rule definitions in regular format and may be used as input
rulefile for subsequent calls of vbind.
-ruleerr
This option makes sense, when testing a new, hand written file containing bind rules. The
-ruleerr option causes syntax errors detected in the rule file to be reported to standard error.
Make sure, that this option occurs on the command line prior to the rulefile to be inspected.
-rulelist
Write a list of all known rule names to standard output.
-ruletest
Interpret all names on the command line as rule names and test the existence of equally named
rules in the list of known rules.
-version
Print version identification of vbind command and used libraries.
-vnum version number
Use version number for binding all names on the command line. This disables any previous -alias,
-bind, -date, -rule or -vnum definition. It does not affect names in pseudo bound version
notation.
ENVIRONMENT
SHAPETOOLS - list of path names as search space for files containing version bind rules. The bind rule
files must be named BindRules. Default path is /usr/local/lib/shape.
FILES
$SHAPETOOLS/lib/shape/BindRules
SEE ALSO
vl(1), sttime(3), bindrules(7)
AUTHOR
Andreas.Lampen@cs.tu-berlin.de