Re: master^ is not a local branch -- huh?!?

From: Jay Soffian <jaysoffian@gmail.com>
Date: Jan 30, 2010, 05:11 UTC
Message-ID: <76718491001292111y2d15620ei8a12c081a9283a07@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <alpine.LFD.2.00.1001292352540.1681@xanadu.home>

On Sat, Jan 30, 2010 at 12:05 AM, Nicolas Pitre <nico@fluxnic.net> wrote:

Show 9 quoted lines

> Thinking more about it, I still consider that making 'git commit' more
> noisy is the wrong approach.  Again, the problem is not about making
> commits on a detached HEAD.  but rather about losing those commits at
> the next 'git checkout'.  Probably a warning should be made when that
> checkout is attempted after one or more commits were made on a detached
> HEAD instead, and refuse the checkout by default unless it is forced (-f
> is already taken for some other force meaning).  The warning should say
> how not to lose those commits by suggesting a branch creation, or give
> the hint for performing the checkout anyway.

This sounds right to me too. There's nothing wrong with having a detached HEAD, and nothing wrong with creating commits in that state. You're effectively creating an anonymous branch in the DAG and it's subject to garbage collection if you move away from that anonymous branch w/o naming it.

Pedantic note: you don't lose those commits at the next checkout. They are merely subject to garbage collection (and not until they age out of HEAD's reflog). I know you know that, just being precise. :-)

j.