Re: git-apply{,mbox,patch} should default to --unidiff-zero

From: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>
Date: Jul 6, 2007, 12:14 UTC
Message-ID: <20070706121441.GM3492@stusta.de>
In-Reply-To: <7vd4z6gkbk.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net>

On Thu, Jul 05, 2007 at 10:41:51PM -0700, Junio C Hamano wrote:

Show 10 quoted lines

> Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org> writes:
>...
> > Adrian has a point in that if there are lines to be deleted, that in 
> > itself is context, and then the strict behaviour of "git-apply" is 
> > arguably unnecessaily strict.
> 
> Not really.  That is true, unless you have two identical
> instances of the group of lines being deleted, in which case you
> cannot safely tell which instance is to be removed.
>...

The interesting thing is that you can never safely tell it for any amount of context - I've seen patches with three lines of context being applied at the wrong place simply because there were several matching contexts.

cu Adrian

-- 
       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed