Re: [PATCH] Document check option to git diff.

From: Bill Lear <rael@zopyra.com>
Date: Jan 27, 2007, 02:06 UTC
Message-ID: <17850.45971.918929.314082@lisa.zopyra.com>
In-Reply-To: <7vodoltkqt.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net>

On Friday, January 26, 2007 at 15:46:02 (-0800) Junio C Hamano writes:

>...
>Thanks.  It's nice to see somebody new getting more and more
>comfortable with git.

I, and my colleagues, are grateful for all the work put into it.

Show 6 quoted lines

>Also I fear that 'valid' is a bit too strong a word here.  ...
>                     ....  How about rewording it like this?
>
>	Look for and warn about changes that introduce trailing
>        whitespaces at the end of the line or an indent that
>        uses a whitespace before a tab.

I was indeed too strong in wording it as "valid": yet another example of haste-induced waste.

I believe that an accurate and concise statement would be:

    Warn if changes introduce trailing whitespace
    or an indent that uses a space before a tab.

I think it should be explicitly limited to "space" and not "whitespace" before the tab, as "whitespace" really includes tab.

Do I really need to say "trailing whitespace at the end of the line"? That seems overly verbose: trailing whitespace is, I think, understood to trail at the end of the line.

I'll re-do the patch when I hear back, probably tomorrow.

Also: I suppose I am wondering about the motivation for this switch.
It seems to reflect the aesthetics of the git project.  Whitespace at
the end of a line is meaningless and wasteful, so I understand and
sympathize with the judgment that this is undesirable.  Spaces
preceding tabs are somewhat murkier: two tabs, a space, and text pass
the check, but a tab, space, tab and text do not.  Why is this bad?

I'm sure there is a better way to categorize these violations other than "funny". Should we not say "wasteful and inelegant, and therefore anathema to any decent, self-respecting person"?

Bill