Re: parse-options does not recognize "unspecified" behavior

From: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Date: Mar 16, 2016, 21:23 UTC
Message-ID: <20160316212308.GA4538@sigill.intra.peff.net>
In-Reply-To: <CAFZEwPMa3GZS6pvFwr8PLVDqKm5xmMd307nbjhpZSC_ndpw8vw@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, Mar 17, 2016 at 02:36:51AM +0530, Pranit Bauva wrote:

Show 18 quoted lines

> > So I think the caller choosing "-1" here as the "not set" value is the
> > bug.
> >
> > -Peff
> 
> I agree to you on the point that parse-options should not care about
> the value passed to it. But I think plainly incrementing the value of
> the variable is not a very nice way. I have an another approach to it.
> The parse-options will first store a temporary structure. If there is
> some changes (not the "--no-" ones) then it sets the respective
> variable in temporary structure to the set value. If "--no-" is passed
> then it writes the "reset" value to the respective variable in
> temporary structure. If nothing about that options is specified then
> it copies the respective variable from original to temporary. After
> completing the entire process, it can copy temporary structure to the
> original structure.
> 
> What are your opinions about this?

I don't think that would produce the wrong behavior, but it seems like a very complicated solution to a problem that can easily be solved by just following the usual conventions (that verbose starts at 0, options make it go up or down, and "--no-" resets it to zero).

Perhaps it would make more sense if I understood what your goal was in setting verbose to -1 in the first place.

-Peff