Re: [RFC/PATCH] gitk: Visualize a merge commit with a right-click in gitk

From: Paul Mackerras <paulus@samba.org>
Date: Dec 31, 2012, 04:27 UTC
Message-ID: <20121231042736.GA14921@iris.ozlabs.ibm.com>
In-Reply-To: <1356826576-24334-1-git-send-email-jason.k.holden.swdev@gmail.com>

On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 07:16:16PM -0500, Jason Holden wrote:

Show 11 quoted lines

> When first doing a merge in git-gui, the "Visualize Merge" button is
> quite helpful to visualize the changes due to a merge.
> But once the merge is complete, there's not a similarly convenient
> way to recreate that merge view in gitk.
> 
> This commit adds to gitk the ability to right-click on a merge commit and
> bring up a new gitk window displaying only those commits involved in
> the merge.
> 
> When right-clicking on a non-merge commit, this option is grayed out.  This
> patch also supports correct visualization of octopus merges

Thanks for the patch. I have a couple of comments about it. First, the exec command waits for the process to complete, which means that the initial gitk GUI will be unresponsive until the user quits the gitk window showing the merge, which could be quite confusing for the user.

Secondly, gitk already has support for showing multiple views of a repository, that is, different subsets of the commits. Wouldn't it be much better to have your new menu item simply create a new view showing the merge, rather than creating a whole new window?

Paul.