Text (non-binary) keyring format

[Ralph Seichter]

* Alejandro Colomar via Gnupg-users:

> I don't use git to be able to roll back, but rather to know at which
> state a backup is.  For example, I gave a backup to a family member last
> time I saw him, and I know that backup is N commits behind my current
> keyring.

Looks like none of this depends on the keyring being stored in a binary
or textual format, does it? Even knowing only the date of having passed
on a backup would be enough to figure out the commits made after handing
over the backup. Then there are commit comments, tags, branchs... Maybe
think of the process of creating and handing over a backup like a
software release?

In any case, as far as I am concerned, the increased performance of
using a binary keyring in daily GnuPG use far outweighs any perceived
convenience of a text-based format, especially when that text-based
format can be easily generated using the "gpg" binary. Note that I am
saying that as a true fan of text-based formats myself.

-Ralph