From: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Date: Tue, 11 Aug 2015 09:54:35 GMT
Subject: Re: [PATCH 04/17] add_to_alternates_file: don't add duplicate entries
Message-ID: <20150811095435.GC10238@sigill.intra.peff.net>
In-Reply-To: <55C97354.7080008@alum.mit.edu>

On Tue, Aug 11, 2015 at 06:00:20AM +0200, Michael Haggerty wrote:

> > Instead of using hold_lock_file_for_append, let's copy the
> > file line by line, which ensures all records are properly
> > terminated. If we see an extra line, we can simply abort the
> > update (there is no point in even copying the rest, as we
> > know that it would be identical to the original).
> 
> Do we have reason to expect that a lot of people have alternates files
> that already contain duplicate lines? You say that this function is only
> called from `git clone`, so I guess the answer is "no".
> 
> But if I'm wrong, it might be friendly to de-dup the existing lines
> while copying them.

You're right; this is not something we expect. There's not really any
way to get an alternates file inside the running clone, except by
putting it in your "templates/" directory.

So I think it is OK to not worry about cleaning up an existing mess.

-Peff