Re: Status of all files (was: Re: How can I tell if a file is ignored by git?

From: Eric Raymond <esr@thyrsus.com>
Date: Apr 9, 2010, 16:24 UTC
Message-ID: <20100409162425.GA32575@thyrsus.com>
In-Reply-To: <vpqy6gw7lio.fsf@bauges.imag.fr>

Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@grenoble-inp.fr>:

Show 10 quoted lines

> Eric Raymond <esr@thyrsus.com> writes:
> 
> > (The ls-files -t codes need better documentation.  If I get detailed enough
> > answers, I will write some.)
> 
> http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/126516
> 
> In short, "git ls-files -t" was written long ago, never tested, and
> probably mostly used by no one. It has a very strange behavior, it's
> not just the doc. I'd advise against using it.

It sounds very much to me as though this feature should be scheduled
for deletion.

Show 7 quoted lines

> "git status --porcelain" is probably what you want:
> 
>        --porcelain
>            Give the output in a stable, easy-to-parse format for
>            scripts. Currently this is identical to --short output, but
>            is guaranteed not to change in the future, making it safe
>            for scripts.

Yes, this looks like what I would want, all right - if the status codes were actually *comprehensible*!

We should tackle this right now, because VC is not the last front end that will need to parse the format and at least I am willing to patch your docs based on what I learn. Most of your other customers won't do that.

I'm going to start a separate thread about this.

-- 
		<a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>