Re: Usability of git stash

From: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Date: Oct 20, 2008, 00:36 UTC
Message-ID: <20081020003644.GA10412@coredump.intra.peff.net>
In-Reply-To: <20081019184029.GF14786@spearce.org>

On Sun, Oct 19, 2008 at 11:40:30AM -0700, Shawn O. Pearce wrote:

Show 8 quoted lines

> Ditto.  I never use "git stash".  Its command line usage is too
> unfriendly for me, so I tend to prefer making WIP commits.  If I
> need to stash something I'll do:
> 
>   git commit -a -m wip
>   ... some time later ..
>   git checkout branch
>   git reset --soft HEAD^

That's what I do, too, except when I want to move changes from one branch to another, or split some changes from their history. So something like:

  git checkout next ;# which is where I usually am anyway
  hack hack hack
  # oops, I have been building this directly on top of next and it
  # really needs to be a feature-branch on maint
  git stash
  git checkout -b jk/maint-fix-whatever origin/maint
  git stash apply

The equivalent non-stash commands would be "commit -m wip" and "cherry-pick". But the stash saves me the trouble later of having to delete the wip cruft on top of next.

Side note: obviously this uses the stash only as a push/pop stack. I have never personally had a situation where I wanted a named stash or multiple stashes over a wip commit.

Show 10 quoted lines

> Personally I wish git-stash wasn't invented the way it is.  I would
> have rather seen it as macros to do a quick:
> 
> 	git commit -m wip-index-state
> 	git commit -A -m wip-worktree-state
> 
> and unwind it with essentially:
> 
> 	git reset --mixed HEAD^
> 	git reset --soft HEAD^

I disagree. I think the strength of stash is that it is divorced from the history. So it is more like a cherry-pick (or diff | apply, which is what it was intended to replace).

> time they ran the stash.  I think its rare you'd stash something
> then switch to another branch to apply it.  But that could easily
> be done with cherry-pick.

I guess we are viewing the tool oppositely. :)

-Peff