Re: [PATCH] Add --show-touched option to show "diff --git" line when contents are unchanged

From: Steven Grimm <koreth@midwinter.com>
Date: Aug 7, 2007, 06:39 UTC
Message-ID: <46B813A0.4040305@midwinter.com>
In-Reply-To: <alpine.LFD.0.999.0708062118190.5037@woody.linux-foundation.org>

Linus Torvalds wrote:

> Doing a "git diff" cannot actually update the index (since it very much 
> has to work on a read-only setup too), which is why the index _stays_ 
> stale unless something is done (eg "git status") to refresh it.

Another thought: How about if git-diff *tries* to update the index if needed, but failure to do so is not treated as an error condition? That seems like the best of both worlds to me: git would self-correct a potential performance problem without user intervention, while still working properly in a read-only environment.

-Steve

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