Merge another component into this one, e.g. a license or template.

Overview a-merge

a-merge is used to merge files from other components into another component typically used to add templates and licenses to a new component or to update them with new versions of licenses, etc.

It is mostly used by developers of components.

Summary a-merge

For example components are described and licensed individually which results in common tasks such as:

1. Add COPYRIGHT, … files for organisation X into this directory.
2. Update file as they change, e.g. new variants of licensing.
3. Expand keywords such as @component@ which is replaced by the component name.

Status a-merge

Related works and references

1. meld - a graphical tool used for merging the changes.

Using a-merge

To merge the files in license-astar and template-c into a-component we would use:

% cd ~/a-team/a-component
% a-merge license-a-star template-c-lib

Keyword expansion

The following keywords are expanded:

Keywords	Expands to
@date@	ISO8601 date, e.g. 2025-04-01
@year@	Year, e.g. 2025
@component@	Componenent name, e.g. a-tv
@description@	Component description, a time ...
@keywords@	Keywords for this component
@author@	Authorname for document from $AUTHOR

Environment Variables

The following environment variables can be used to configure a-merge.

Environment Variable	Meaning
AUTHOR	Name to put in documents as the AUTHOR
MERGE	Tool do the merge which defaults to meld

Implementation of a-merge

A TCL script which calls existing merge tools.

Security implications of a-merge

TBA

Further sources for @component@

TBA