Re: [RFC 2/2] pull: default pull.ff to "only" when pull.rebase is not set either

From: Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.email>
Date: Nov 25, 2020, 13:25 UTC
Message-ID: <67e55d85-63a4-9a47-e633-52b2ece23758@iee.email>
In-Reply-To: <CAMP44s3-fJ=mrYjGTW3AUACBmEhyrdD0dRktdaKHK9b1MTbk2A@mail.gmail.com>

On 25/11/2020 03:47, Felipe Contreras wrote:

Show 16 quoted lines

> On Tue, Nov 24, 2020 at 9:45 PM Felipe Contreras
> <felipe.contreras@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Tue, Nov 24, 2020 at 8:14 PM Alex Henrie <alexhenrie24@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Before making this the default we need a solution *right now* that is
>> a sane default.
> This mail was sent by mistake. I was going to say:
>
> We need a warning like:
>
>   The pull was not fast-forward, please either merge or rebase.
>
> When the default (pull.ff=only) is set.
>
> It is the current status that is more urgent to fix.
>

Maybe this could also, as an interim measure, be a doc change right in the first paragraph of the `git pull --help` description section to warn that its current default may not be suitable for most users, and to see the `--ff-only` option (and variants) and its matching config variable.

e.g. "In its default mode, git pull uses the --ff option and is
shorthand for git fetch followed by git merge FETCH_HEAD. The --ff-only
option may be more suitable for modern usage. It can be set using `git
config pull.ff only`."
 (then once v3.0 arrives the discussion can be flipped)

It's worth making sure that the manuals are easy to read.

Philip