git problems/question

[Christian Groessler <chris at groessler dot org>]

Hi,

I'm maintaining a local architecture, where our code is based on 2.23.2, 
currently.

I want to update it to 2.27.

My general idea is:

1) checkout 2.23.2 (tag "binutils-2_23_2")
2) create a new branch from here
3) add our changes
4) merge 2.27

This doesn't work. I'm getting many conflicts.

So I made a test, omitting step 3 from above, and using 2.23 instead of 
2.23.2:

-----
$ git clone ssh://sourceware.org/git/binutils-gdb.git
... (downloading) ...
$ git checkout -b test-branch binutils-2_23
Switched to a new branch 'test-branch'
$ git merge binutils-2_27
... (getting many conflicts) ...
$ git status
... (many changed files)... and:
Unmerged paths:
  (use "git add/rm <file>..." as appropriate to mark resolution)

        deleted by us:   .gitignore
        both modified:   ChangeLog
        both modified:   Makefile.in
        both modified:   bfd/ChangeLog
        both modified:   bfd/Makefile.am
        both modified:   bfd/Makefile.in
        both modified:   bfd/archures.c
        both modified:   bfd/bfd-in2.h
        both modified:   bfd/config.bfd
        both modified:   bfd/configure
        deleted by them: bfd/configure.in
        both added:      bfd/cpu-aarch64.c
        added by them:   bfd/development.sh
... (many more) ...
-----


I would have expected a few conflicts, for sure, since both 2.23 and 
2.27 are from branches. But they seem to be too many to me.

Also, many of the conflicts are gdb related, which aren't important 
here. Is there an easy way to get rid of them?

Does anyone have a good idea how I could accomplish my task without 
manually checking a huge number of files for conflicts/changes?

regards,
chris