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[PATCH 10/10] get_short_sha1: list ambiguous objects on error

From
Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Date
Sep 26, 2016, 12:00 UTC
Message-ID
<20160926120036.mqs435a36njeihq6@sigill.intra.peff.net>
In-Reply-To
<20160926115720.p2yb22lcq37gboon@sigill.intra.peff.net>

When the user gives us an ambiguous short sha1, we print an error and refuse to resolve it. In some cases, the next step is for them to feed us more characters (e.g., if they were retyping or cut-and-pasting from a full sha1). But in other cases, that might be all they have. For example, an old commit message may have used a 7-character hex that was unique at the time, but is now ambiguous. Git doesn't provide any information about the ambiguous objects it found, so it's hard for the user to find out which one they probably meant.

This patch teaches get_short_sha1() to list the sha1s of the objects it found, along with a few bits of information that may help the user decide which one they meant. Here's what it looks like on git.git:

  $ git rev-parse b2e1
  error: short SHA1 b2e1 is ambiguous
  hint: The candidates are:
  hint:   b2e1196 tag v2.8.0-rc1
  hint:   b2e11d1 tree
  hint:   b2e1632 commit 2007-11-14 - Merge branch 'bs/maint-commit-options'
  hint:   b2e1759 blob
  hint:   b2e18954 blob
  hint:   b2e1895c blob
  fatal: ambiguous argument 'b2e1': unknown revision or path not in the working tree.
  Use '--' to separate paths from revisions, like this:
  'git <command> [<revision>...] -- [<file>...]'

We show the tagname for tags, and the date and subject for commits. For trees and blobs, in theory we could dig in the history to find the paths at which they were present. But that's very expensive (on the order of 30s for the kernel), and it's not likely to be all that helpful. Most short references are to commits, so the useful information is typically going to be that the object in question _isn't_ a commit. So it's silly to spend a lot of CPU preemptively digging up the path; the user can do it themselves if they really need to.

And of course it's somewhat ironic that we abbreviate the sha1s in the disambiguation hint. But full sha1s would cause annoying line wrapping for the commit lines, and presumably the user is going to just re-issue their command immediately with the corrected sha1.

We also restrict the list to those that match any disambiguation hint. E.g.:

  $ git rev-parse b2e1:foo
  error: short SHA1 b2e1 is ambiguous
  hint: The candidates are:
  hint:   b2e1196 tag v2.8.0-rc1
  hint:   b2e11d1 tree
  hint:   b2e1632 commit 2007-11-14 - Merge branch 'bs/maint-commit-options'
  fatal: Invalid object name 'b2e1'.

does not bother reporting the blobs, because they cannot work as a treeish.

Signed-off-by: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
---
 sha1_name.c                         | 50 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++--
 t/t1512-rev-parse-disambiguation.sh | 24 ++++++++++++++++++
 2 files changed, 72 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
diff --git a/sha1_name.c b/sha1_name.c
index f7403d7..35d943d 100644
--- a/sha1_name.c
+++ b/sha1_name.c
@@ -318,6 +318,38 @@ static int init_object_disambiguation(const char *name, int len,
 	return 0;
 }
 
+static int show_ambiguous_object(const unsigned char *sha1, void *data)
+{
+	const struct disambiguate_state *ds = data;
+	struct strbuf desc = STRBUF_INIT;
+	int type;
+
+	if (ds->fn && !ds->fn(sha1, ds->cb_data))
+		return 0;
+
+	type = sha1_object_info(sha1, NULL);
+	if (type == OBJ_COMMIT) {
+		struct commit *commit = lookup_commit(sha1);
+		if (commit) {
+			struct pretty_print_context pp = {0};
+			pp.date_mode.type = DATE_SHORT;
+			format_commit_message(commit, " %ad - %s", &desc, &pp);
+		}
+	} else if (type == OBJ_TAG) {
+		struct tag *tag = lookup_tag(sha1);
+		if (!parse_tag(tag) && tag->tag)
+			strbuf_addf(&desc, " %s", tag->tag);
+	}
+
+	advise("  %s %s%s",
+	       find_unique_abbrev(sha1, DEFAULT_ABBREV),
+	       typename(type) ? typename(type) : "unknown type",
+	       desc.buf);
+
+	strbuf_release(&desc);
+	return 0;
+}
+
 static int multiple_bits_set(unsigned flags)
 {
 	return !!(flags & (flags - 1));
@@ -351,8 +383,22 @@ static int get_short_sha1(const char *name, int len, unsigned char *sha1,
 	find_short_packed_object(&ds);
 	status = finish_object_disambiguation(&ds, sha1);
 
-	if (!quietly && (status == SHORT_NAME_AMBIGUOUS))
-		return error(_("short SHA1 %s is ambiguous"), ds.hex_pfx);
+	if (!quietly && (status == SHORT_NAME_AMBIGUOUS)) {
+		error(_("short SHA1 %s is ambiguous"), ds.hex_pfx);
+
+		/*
+		 * We may still have ambiguity if we simply saw a series of
+		 * candidates that did not satisfy our hint function. In
+		 * that case, we still want to show them, so disable the hint
+		 * function entirely.
+		 */
+		if (!ds.ambiguous)
+			ds.fn = NULL;
+
+		advise(_("The candidates are:"));
+		for_each_abbrev(ds.hex_pfx, show_ambiguous_object, &ds);
+	}
+
 	return status;
 }
 
diff --git a/t/t1512-rev-parse-disambiguation.sh b/t/t1512-rev-parse-disambiguation.sh
index 1d8f550..c5447ef 100755
--- a/t/t1512-rev-parse-disambiguation.sh
+++ b/t/t1512-rev-parse-disambiguation.sh
@@ -323,4 +323,28 @@ test_expect_success C_LOCALE_OUTPUT 'ambiguity errors are not repeated (peel)' '
 	test_line_count = 1 errors
 '
 
+test_expect_success C_LOCALE_OUTPUT 'ambiguity hints' '
+	test_must_fail git rev-parse 000000000 2>stderr &&
+	grep ^hint: stderr >hints &&
+	# 16 candidates, plus one intro line
+	test_line_count = 17 hints
+'
+
+test_expect_success C_LOCALE_OUTPUT 'ambiguity hints respect type' '
+	test_must_fail git rev-parse 000000000^{commit} 2>stderr &&
+	grep ^hint: stderr >hints &&
+	# 5 commits, 1 tag (which is a commitish), plus intro line
+	test_line_count = 7 hints
+'
+
+test_expect_success C_LOCALE_OUTPUT 'failed type-selector still shows hint' '
+	# these two blobs share the same prefix "ee3d", but neither
+	# will pass for a commit
+	echo 851 | git hash-object --stdin -w &&
+	echo 872 | git hash-object --stdin -w &&
+	test_must_fail git rev-parse ee3d^{commit} 2>stderr &&
+	grep ^hint: stderr >hints &&
+	test_line_count = 3 hints
+'
+
 test_done
-- 
2.10.0.492.g14f803f
Previous: Jeff KingNext: Linus Torvalds
Message 24 of 111 in “Changing the default for "core.abbrev"?”
  1. Linus TorvaldsSep 26, 2016
  2. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  3. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  4. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  5. 0/10 helping people resolve ambiguous sha1sJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  6. 01/10 get_sha1: detect buggy calls with multiple disambiguatorsJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  7. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  8. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  9. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  10. 02/10 get_sha1: avoid repeating ourselves via ONLY_TO_DIEJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  11. 03/10 get_sha1: propagate flags to child functionsJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  12. 04/10 get_short_sha1: peel tags when looking for treeishJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  13. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  14. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  15. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  16. 05/10 get_short_sha1: refactor init of disambiguation codeJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  17. 06/10 get_short_sha1: NUL-terminate hex prefixJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  18. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  19. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  20. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  21. 07/10 get_short_sha1: mark ambiguity error for translationJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  22. 08/10 sha1_array: let callbacks interrupt iterationJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  23. 09/10 for_each_abbrev: drop duplicate objectsJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  24. 10/10 get_short_sha1: list ambiguous objects on errorJeff King, Sep 26, 2016
  25. Linus TorvaldsSep 26, 2016
  26. Jacob KellerSep 27, 2016
  27. Jeff KingSep 27, 2016
  28. Kyle J. McKaySep 29, 2016
  29. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  30. Kyle J. McKaySep 29, 2016
  31. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  32. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  33. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  34. Junio C HamanoSep 26, 2016
  35. Kyle J. McKaySep 29, 2016
  36. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  37. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  38. Jacob KellerSep 30, 2016
  39. core.abbrev doc: document and test the abbreviation lengthÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, Feb 4, 2019
  40. Junio C HamanoFeb 4, 2019
  41. Junio C HamanoFeb 4, 2019
  42. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonFeb 4, 2019
  43. Jeff KingFeb 4, 2019
  44. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonFeb 4, 2019
  45. Jeff KingFeb 6, 2019
  46. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonFeb 6, 2019
  47. Matthieu MoySep 26, 2016
  48. Jeff KingSep 26, 2016
  49. Kyle J. McKaySep 29, 2016
  50. Christian CouderSep 26, 2016
  51. 0/4 raising core.abbrev default to 12 hexdigitsJunio C Hamano, Sep 28, 2016
  52. 3/4 worktree: honor configuration variablesJunio C Hamano, Sep 28, 2016
  53. 4/4 core.abbrev: raise the default abbreviation to 12 hexdigitsJunio C Hamano, Sep 28, 2016
  54. SZEDER GáborSep 29, 2016
  55. Lukas FleischerSep 29, 2016
  56. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  57. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  58. Matthieu MoySep 29, 2016
  59. SZEDER GáborSep 29, 2016
  60. Johannes SixtSep 29, 2016
  61. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  62. Linus TorvaldsSep 29, 2016
  63. Linus TorvaldsSep 29, 2016
  64. Linus TorvaldsSep 29, 2016
  65. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  66. Mike HommeySep 30, 2016
  67. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  68. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonSep 30, 2016
  69. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  70. Linus TorvaldsSep 29, 2016
  71. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  72. Linus TorvaldsSep 29, 2016
  73. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  74. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  75. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  76. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  77. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  78. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  79. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  80. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  81. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  82. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  83. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  84. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  85. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  86. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  87. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  88. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  89. Jeff KingSep 30, 2016
  90. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  91. Jeff KingSep 30, 2016
  92. Linus TorvaldsSep 30, 2016
  93. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  94. Junio C HamanoSep 30, 2016
  95. Jeff KingSep 30, 2016
  96. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  97. 2/4 t13xx: do not assume system config is emptyJunio C Hamano, Sep 28, 2016
  98. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  99. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  100. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  101. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  102. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  103. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  104. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  105. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  106. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  107. Jeff KingSep 29, 2016
  108. 1/4 config: allow customizing /etc/gitconfig locationJunio C Hamano, Sep 28, 2016
  109. Jakub NarębskiSep 29, 2016
  110. Junio C HamanoSep 29, 2016
  111. Matthieu MoySep 29, 2016

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