Re: [PATCH v2] git-pull.sh --rebase: overhaul error handling when no candidates are found

From: Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>
Date: Nov 13, 2009, 04:07 UTC
Message-ID: <20091113040754.GA3255@progeny.tock>
In-Reply-To: <20091112170814.1858aba4@perceptron>

Jan Krüger wrote:

> Subject: [PATCH v2] git-pull.sh --rebase: overhaul error handling when no candidates are found

s/error handling/error message/. :)

> --- a/git-pull.sh
> +++ b/git-pull.sh
> @@ -91,45 +91,56 @@ error_on_no_merge_candidates () {

[...]

Show 5 quoted lines

>  	if [ $# -gt 1 ]; then
> -		echo "There are no candidates for merging in the refs that you just fetched."
> +		echo "There are no candidates for using the refs that you just fetched."
>  		echo "Generally this means that you provided a wildcard refspec which had no"
>  		echo "matches on the remote end."

This sounds a little awkward to me, maybe because all the remote refs are being used to populate the remotes/<remote>/* hierarchy.

I’m trying to come up with an alternative wording, but it is hard:

 * Merging and rebasing are about incorporating the remote history
   into our own, so how about something like "... no candidates for
   incorporating from the refs ..."?

 * Maybe one is using 'git pull' to update.  "There are no
   candidates to use for an update among the refs that you just
   fetched."

 * Or: "There are no upstreams to local branches among the refs that
   you just fetched."

I like the third of these best, but I hope you can do better.

>  	elif [ $# -gt 0 ] && [ "$1" != "$remote" ]; then
>  		echo "You asked to pull from the remote '$1', but did not specify"
> -		echo "a branch to merge. Because this is not the default configured remote"
> +		echo "a branch to use. Because this is not the default configured remote"

Maybe just "... did not specify a branch."?

Show 6 quoted lines

>  		echo "for your current branch, you must specify a branch on the command line."
>  	elif [ -z "$curr_branch" ]; then
>  		echo "You are not currently on a branch, so I cannot use any"
>  		echo "'branch.<branchname>.merge' in your configuration file."
> -		echo "Please specify which branch you want to merge on the command"
> +		echo "Please specify which branch you want to use on the command"

s/branch/remote branch/? The reader might worry that the command is going to try to re-attach his HEAD.

The rest of your patch looks good to me.  Thanks for working on this.

Jonathan