Re: Calling all bash completion experts..

From: Shawn Pearce <spearce@spearce.org>
Date: Nov 26, 2006, 04:03 UTC
Message-ID: <20061126040358.GA29855@spearce.org>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0611251106250.6991@woody.osdl.org>

Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org> wrote:

Show 20 quoted lines

> 
> On Sat, 25 Nov 2006, Shawn Pearce wrote:
> > 
> > I added the nospace option because of the completion for fetch/push,
> > cat-file, diff-tree and ls-tree.
> > 
> > The problem is the file completion for e.g. cat-file.  We don't
> > want a space added after we complete a directory name, so you can
> > complete further, e.g.:
> > 
> >   git cat-file -p ma<tab>con<tab>comp<tab>git-com<tab>
> 
> But that's how directory completion _always_ works. Completion doesn't add 
> spaces to directories anyway, it adds a "/".
> 
> The branch-name thing is well-taken: you don't want to add a space after a 
> branch-name, although neither do you want to add a ":" by default.
> 
> So "nospace" after a branch (or tag) name sounds sane, but nowhere else 
> that I can see.

All in all what you are asking is reasonable. Users really should expect the Git completion to work just like any other completion built-in to bash. I've just run into some difficulty making that be the case with all of the git commands. :)

I'm trying to push really hard on git-gui right now, to get it to the point that people who are absolutely terrified of the command line can still do basic operations (commit, fetch, trivial merge, push). 'cause I really need to get a some of those users onto a git repository (like everyone else) rather than an unbacked-up network share which has no revision history.

I'll come back to the bash completion soon. Jakub Narebski and another person have both asked that I do some more work for other commands. I was hoping that other person might do some of the modifications himself and contribute them back, but it looks like he's just as busy as I am and hasn't found the time.