Re: [PATCH 7/7] xdiff: make diff3 the default conflictStyle

From: Felipe Contreras <felipe.contreras@gmail.com>
Date: Jun 10, 2021, 14:19 UTC
Message-ID: <60c21f5eb4c62_b25b1208ae@natae.notmuch>
In-Reply-To: <bddfe587-704c-a7b2-1182-246226aa09ba@gmail.com>

Phillip Wood wrote:

Show 6 quoted lines

> On 09/06/2021 20:28, Felipe Contreras wrote:
> > Virtually everyone is using it, and it's one of the first things we
> > teach newcomers in order to resolve conflicts efficiently.
> 
> Given there are millions of users I'm not sure how you established that 
> virtually everyone is using it.

Because it's the stablished consensus that resolving conflicts with merge.conflictstyle=merge is suboptimal.

Even if it's not the majority using it (say 49%), the majority would benefit from using it.

> I think that while this change would be useful to some users (though
> not many if virtually everyone already has it set) it has the
> potential to annoy a lot of users who are happy with the existing
> default.

Every change has the potential to annoy some users.

That's an argument against further development of git, not this particular patch.

> I do not think that it is a positive change over all.

OK. Others disagree.

> Had the default been diff3 from early on in git's history then I would 
> not advocate changing it to the current default but I think the time has 
> passed when it can be changed without inconveniencing existing users.

git has changed defaults in the past, and it will change defaults in the future.

There will always be people pushing back against progress, and that is good. But progress happens regardless.

Cheers.

-- 
Felipe Contreras