Re: [PATCH] git.c: show usage for accessing the git(1) help page
- From
Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.org>
- Date
- May 15, 2019, 06:43 UTC
- Message-ID
- <7bd330d7-81f1-52b4-52d3-b74b128af83a@iee.org>
- In-Reply-To
- <20190515015331.GC13255@sigill.intra.peff.net>
Hi Peff,
On 15/05/2019 02:53, Jeff King wrote:
Show 17 quoted lines
> On Tue, May 14, 2019 at 05:17:17PM -0700, Emily Shaffer wrote:
>
>>> const char git_more_info_string[] =
>>> N_("'git help -a' and 'git help -g' list available subcommands and some\n"
>>> "concept guides. See 'git help <command>' or 'git help <concept>'\n"
>>> - "to read about a specific subcommand or concept.");
>>> + "to read about a specific subcommand or concept. Or use 'git help git'.");
>> I'm not sure the wording makes sense here. It sounds like you're saying,
>> "Or use 'git help git' to read about specific subcommands or concepts."
>> which isn't really what I think you're trying to say.
>>
>> What about, "Or, use 'git help git' for a detailed guide of the Git
>> system as a whole."
> I had a similar reaction on reading Philip's patch. I think your
> suggestion is better. We could even shorten it to just:
>
> Use 'git help git' for an overview of the system.That is a lot better. I like it. Concise and effective. I'll create a v2.
Show 5 quoted lines
> > Looking at "git help git" I actually think the DESCRIPTION section could > do a better job of being a first entry-point for new readers of the > documentation. But I don't think that needs to be a blocker for what > we're discussing here.
I'd agree for both points.
Show 18 quoted lines
> >> (I'm still not sure that's quite it - since `git help git` mostly >> details the flags you can pass to git before invoking a subcommand. But >> I'm not sure that `git --help` is the place to say that...) > Yeah, I almost suggested something like: > > Use 'git help git' for options and environment variables that affect > all subcommands. > > I'm not sure if that points people in a useful direction, or if it is > getting too much into the weeds (again, probably the description section > of git(1) could talk about how to find which documentation where. > > I also think it should point to git-scm.com for the hyper-linked > documentation, since it's less ugly than the stuff at git.github.io, but > that's really getting off-topic. :) > > -Peff
Interestingly, try seeing if you can use tab completion to type in 'git help git'. It's nearly as hard to find as the user-manual, which isn't a man(1) page ;-)
Philip