There is a quite well-known and convenient tool for managing interdependent patches in Git branches -- topgit. (With respect to gear and packaging, I've written down some notes: http://www.altlinux.org/Git/MergingBranches#topgit . It would be nice to manage the patches that get into the packages as topgit branches, and for maintainers to collectively work on them, and to communicate with upstream using topgit branches and generated patches.)


Unfortunately, girar doesn't allow to store the refs used by topgit:

~/TOOLS/topgit/topgit.gear $ tg remote imz@ALT
tg: Remote imz@ALT can now follow TopGit topic branches.
tg: Next, do: git fetch imz@ALT
~/TOOLS/topgit/topgit.gear $ git fetch imz@ALT
~/TOOLS/topgit/topgit.gear $ tg push -r imz@ALT
Counting objects: 13, done.
Delta compression using up to 2 threads.
Compressing objects: 100% (12/12), done.
Writing objects: 100% (13/13), 2.60 KiB | 0 bytes/s, done.
Total 13 (delta 6), reused 0 (delta 0)
remote: girar-update: Unrecognized ref name: refs/top-bases/tg_rename        
remote: error: hook declined to update refs/top-bases/tg_rename        
remote: girar-sendmail: email notification about `refs/heads/tg_rename' update sent.        
remote: Repacking repository... done        
remote: Updating committer date cache... done        
To git.alt:packages/topgit.git
 * [new branch]      tg_rename -> tg_rename
 ! [remote rejected] refs/top-bases/tg_rename -> refs/top-bases/tg_rename (hook declined)
error: failed to push some refs to 'git.alt:packages/topgit.git'
~/TOOLS/topgit/topgit.gear $