Re: git should not use a default user.email config value

From: Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu>
Date: Aug 10, 2013, 11:42 UTC
Message-ID: <5206273C.3050803@alum.mit.edu>
In-Reply-To: <20130810102834.GA6237@sigill.intra.peff.net>

On 08/10/2013 12:28 PM, Jeff King wrote:

Show 18 quoted lines

> On Sat, Aug 10, 2013 at 11:59:21AM +0200, Michael Haggerty wrote:
> 
>> On 08/10/2013 08:47 AM, Jeff King wrote:
>>> But I think MX records and deliverability is beside the point. Even in a
>>> case where we come up with a valid, deliverable address, is that what
>>> the user wants to have in their commit history for all time?
>>
>> I intentionally don't set user.email in my ~/.gitconfig because I use
>> different identities (on the same machine) depending on what project I
>> am committing to (open-source vs. work).  After I clone a repo, I *rely*
>> on Git reminding me to set user.email on my first commit, because I
>> invariably forget to set it myself.  And for me, *any* universal,
>> heuristically-determined email address would be wrong for me for at
>> least some repos.
> 
> So if I understand your use case, then you would be even happier if
> rather than giving a warning, git simply barfed and said "please set
> your identity before committing"?

Yes, definitely.

For the particular use case that I described, I wouldn't mind setting a global setting "barfOnMissingEmail = true" because I always use the same Linux account. But for other uses cases that arise at my company, people have to jump around from one computer to another, and it would be more convenient if the barfing behavior was the default without the need for a setting.

Michael

-- 
Michael Haggerty
mhagger@alum.mit.edu
http://softwareswirl.blogspot.com/