Re: [PATCH] Provide a 'git help user-manual' route to the docbook

From: Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.org>
Date: Feb 18, 2014, 22:14 UTC
Message-ID: <5561391C5EED4114A90C35518558A267@PhilipOakley>
In-Reply-To: <xmqqha7wdvpz.fsf@gitster.dls.corp.google.com>

From: "Junio C Hamano" <gitster@pobox.com>

Show 30 quoted lines

> Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.org> writes:
>
>> diff --git a/Documentation/gituser-manual.txt 
>> b/Documentation/gituser-manual.txt
>> new file mode 100644
>> index 0000000..9fd4744
>> --- /dev/null
>> +++ b/Documentation/gituser-manual.txt
>> @@ -0,0 +1,34 @@
>> +gituser-manual(7)
>> +=================
>> +
>> +NAME
>> +----
>> +gituser-manual - a link to the user-manual docbook
>> +
>> +
>> +SYNOPSIS
>> +--------
>> +[verse]
>> +'git help user-manual'
>> +
>> +link:user-manual.html[Git User's Manual]
>
> Is it just me, or is typing
>
> $ git help user-manual
>
> and not seeing the manual itself, but only a link you have to click
> to get there a worthwhile addition?

It is a half-way house, partly because the current 'git help <name>' processing always assumes that the target is a man page, and that the page name will always be 'git<name>. Thus the current user-manual isn't immediately visible to the help system. Also it's not (quite reasonably) formatted as a man page either.

This was an attempt to offer more ways for users to discover the user-manual, as it would also be listed in the 'git help -g' output. To make that work required a proper man-page, hence the patch. Also I was avoiding the renaming of the user-manual.txt & user-manual.html file because of possible link breakages from external sources.

>
> I would not mind having a clickable link in the output from
>
> $ git help git

There is now a link within the git(1) page, though folk maybe leaping past it to the list of commands and env variables, etc.

I'm generally in favour of providing more help sign-posting from more directions where possible.

Show 41 quoted lines

>
> or something that does already have other useful information, though.
>
>> +
>> +DESCRIPTION
>> +-----------
>> +Git is a fast, scalable, distributed revision control system with an
>> +unusually rich command set that provides both high-level operations
>> +and full access to internals.
>> +
>> +The link:user-manual.html[Git User's Manual] provides an
>> +in-depth introduction to Git.
>> +
>> +SEE ALSO
>> +--------
>> +linkgit:gittutorial[7],
>> +linkgit:giteveryday[7],
>> +linkgit:gitcli[7],
>> +linkgit:gitworkflows[7]
>> +
>> +GIT
>> +---
>> +Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite
>> diff --git a/builtin/help.c b/builtin/help.c
>> index 1fdefeb..be7c39d 100644
>> --- a/builtin/help.c
>> +++ b/builtin/help.c
>> @@ -427,6 +427,7 @@ static struct {
>>  { "modules", N_("Defining submodule properties") },
>>  { "revisions", N_("Specifying revisions and ranges for Git") },
>>  { "tutorial", N_("A tutorial introduction to Git (for version 1.5.1 
>> or newer)") },
>> + { "user-manual", N_("A link to the user-manual docbook") },
>>  { "workflows", N_("An overview of recommended workflows with 
>> Git") },
>>  };
> --
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