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Autori principali: Gu, Qiqi Jason, Janota, Mikoláš
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2026
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Accesso online:https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.13813
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author Gu, Qiqi Jason
Janota, Mikoláš
author_facet Gu, Qiqi Jason
Janota, Mikoláš
contents Merging is a core operation in version control systems such as Git, but traditional line-based algorithms often yield spurious conflicts, particularly in the presence of refactorings or parallel edits. While syntax- and semantics-aware merging approaches can reduce conflicts, they introduce drawbacks such as loss of formatting, dependence on language-specific parsers, and limited flexibility across heterogeneous artifacts. To address this gap, we present Summer, a novel textual token-based merge algorithm independent of document formats. Dividing text into tokens, our approach formulates token-level changes in one branch into string-rewriting rules and move rules, and applies these rules to the text of the other branch to construct a merge. Despite being independent on programming languages, our move rules model extracting and inlining functions. We evaluated Summer on ConflictBench, a large benchmark of real-world merge scenarios, comparing it with five pioneering merge tools across Java and non-Java files. Experimental results show that Summer achieved the highest 36% accuracy in reproducing merges verbatim identical to developers', and ranked second in semantic accuracy.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_13813
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A Universal Textual Merge Strategy Based on Tokens for Version Control Systems
Gu, Qiqi Jason
Janota, Mikoláš
Software Engineering
Merging is a core operation in version control systems such as Git, but traditional line-based algorithms often yield spurious conflicts, particularly in the presence of refactorings or parallel edits. While syntax- and semantics-aware merging approaches can reduce conflicts, they introduce drawbacks such as loss of formatting, dependence on language-specific parsers, and limited flexibility across heterogeneous artifacts. To address this gap, we present Summer, a novel textual token-based merge algorithm independent of document formats. Dividing text into tokens, our approach formulates token-level changes in one branch into string-rewriting rules and move rules, and applies these rules to the text of the other branch to construct a merge. Despite being independent on programming languages, our move rules model extracting and inlining functions. We evaluated Summer on ConflictBench, a large benchmark of real-world merge scenarios, comparing it with five pioneering merge tools across Java and non-Java files. Experimental results show that Summer achieved the highest 36% accuracy in reproducing merges verbatim identical to developers', and ranked second in semantic accuracy.
title A Universal Textual Merge Strategy Based on Tokens for Version Control Systems
topic Software Engineering
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.13813