Re: [PATCH 1/2] user-manual: add global config section

From: Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>
Date: Oct 11, 2009, 22:27 UTC
Message-ID: <20091011222729.GA5114@progeny.tock>
In-Reply-To: <1255293786-17293-2-git-send-email-felipe.contreras@gmail.com>

Felipe Contreras wrote:

Show 5 quoted lines

> So that users get to know how to configure git from the get-to with good
> practical example (color.ui = auto) that most people would probably like
> anyway.
> 
> Signed-off-by: Felipe Contreras <felipe.contreras@gmail.com>

Good idea.  Some comments:

> +Git's configuration is distributed among different locations--this manual will
> +only to deal with 'global' (for the user) and 'repository' variables, where
> +'repository' variables take precedence over 'global' ones.

What are these different locations you speak of? If git’s configuration is complicated to deal with, maybe that is something that could be improved.

This is very early in the manual, where every word counts. I am not very good at wording and do not have any better suggestions, but would it be possible to more efficiently convey this:

	Git reads its per-user configuration from ~/.gitignore.

	That file can also be manipulated with the "git config"
	command, which can be convenient in scripts or when using
	operating systems like Windows where it is not clear where
	the home directory is.

	For example, if your terminal supports it, you can tell Git
	to use color in the output for commands such as "git diff"
	with "git config --global color.ui auto".

	For more information and a list of possible settings, see
	git-config(1).

By the way, this reminds me that I am not sure git-config(1) conveys the list of configuration items in an ideal way. It can be easy to dismiss that page as plumbing documentation when seeing it for the first time. Should we ship a sample .gitconfig with all items included and comments describing them, or a separate gitconfig(5)? Either would be easy to generate from config.txt.

Thoughts? Jonathan