contrib/plan9/README

sparse: move config parsing into core

This patch marks the beginning of moving code from the sparse
extension into core. The goal is to move as much of the
functionality as possible into core, where it will be an
experimental feature. The extension will likely continue to
exist to enable the feature and provide UI elements.

As part of the move, the repo method was converted to a module
function. It doesn't need to exist on repos.

An error message was also updated to reflect that an error isn't
necessarily from the .hg/sparse file. The API should be updated
later to pass in a filename so the error can be more descriptive.

Copyright of the added file was copied from the sparse extension.

Mercurial for Plan 9 from Bell Labs
===================================

This directory contains support for Mercurial on Plan 9 from Bell Labs
platforms. It is assumed that the version of Python running on these
systems supports the ANSI/POSIX Environment (APE). At the time of this
writing, the bichued/python port is the most commonly installed version
of Python on these platforms. If a native port of Python is ever made,
some minor modification will need to be made to support some of the more
esoteric requirements of the platform rather than those currently made
(cf. posix.py).

By default, installations will have the factotum extension enabled; this
extension permits factotum(4) to act as an authentication agent for
HTTP repositories. Additionally, an extdiff command named 9diff is
enabled which generates diff(1) compatible output suitable for use with
the plumber(4).

Commit messages are plumbed using E if no editor is defined; users must
update the plumbed file to continue, otherwise the hg process must be
interrupted.

Some work remains with regard to documentation. Section 5 manual page
references for hgignore and hgrc need to be re-numbered to section 6 (file
formats) and a new man page writer should be written to support the
Plan 9 man macro set. Until these issues can be resolved, manual pages
are elided from the installation.

Basic install:

  % mk install      # do a system-wide install
  % hg debuginstall # sanity-check setup
  % hg              # see help

A proto(2) file is included in this directory as an example of how a
binary distribution could be packaged, ostensibly with contrib(1).

See https://mercurial-scm.org/ for detailed installation
instructions, platform-specific notes, and Mercurial user information.