From: Derrick Stolee <stolee@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2025 20:00:30 GMT
Subject: Re: [PATCH] last-modified: support sparse checkouts
Message-ID: <75f862a5-2663-4211-b96c-d2c5d1c6f91e@gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <pull.2013.git.1764423826908.gitgitgadget@gmail.com>

On 11/29/2025 8:43 AM, Johannes Schindelin via GitGitGadget wrote:
> From: Johannes Schindelin <johannes.schindelin@gmx.de>
> 
> In a sparse checkout, a user might want to run `last-modified` on a
> directory outside the worktree.
> 
> And even in non-sparse checkouts, a user might need to run that command
> on a directory that does not exist in the worktree.
> 
> These use cases should be supported via the `--` separator between
> revision and file arguments, which is even advertised in the
> documentation. This patch fixes a tiny bug that prevents that from
> working.

>  	argc = parse_options(argc, argv, prefix, last_modified_options,
>  			     last_modified_usage,
> -			     PARSE_OPT_KEEP_ARGV0 | PARSE_OPT_KEEP_UNKNOWN_OPT);
> +			     PARSE_OPT_KEEP_ARGV0 | PARSE_OPT_KEEP_UNKNOWN_OPT |
> +			     PARSE_OPT_KEEP_DASHDASH);

I'm intrigued that this is the only fix that was required.

> +test_expect_success 'last-modified in sparse checkout' '
> +	test_when_finished "git sparse-checkout disable" &&
> +	git sparse-checkout set b &&
> +	check_last_modified -- a <<-\EOF

Would we expect this to work without the '--'? Should it
fail for a directory that exists at HEAD but is outside of
the sparse-checkout?

Thanks,
-Stolee