Re: [PATCH] git-completion: Add git help completion for aliases

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Mar 22, 2011, 07:53 UTC
Message-ID: <7v4o6vmvzs.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.1.00.1103212302000.1561@bonsai2>

Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> writes:

Show 25 quoted lines

>> > diff --git a/contrib/completion/git-completion.bash
>> > b/contrib/completion/git-completion.bash
>> > index 893b771..f9a74d3 100755
>> > --- a/contrib/completion/git-completion.bash
>> > +++ b/contrib/completion/git-completion.bash
>> > @@ -1506,7 +1506,7 @@ _git_help ()
>> >  		;;
>> >  	esac
>> >  	__git_compute_all_commands
>> > -	__gitcomp "$__git_all_commands
>> > +	__gitcomp "$__git_all_commands $(__git_aliases)
>> >  		attributes cli core-tutorial cvs-migration
>> >  		diffcore gitk glossary hooks ignore modules
>> >  		repository-layout tutorial tutorial-2
>> 
>> This patch may not be _wrong_ per-se, but it it useful in practice?
>> 
>> I dunno.
>> 
>> Don't people usually use aliases so that they do not have to type long
>> command names that would need completion?
>
> Yes. And if you use a lot of aliases, or a lot of machines with evolving 
> aliases, the easiest way to inspect the alias is "git help <alias>". Not 
> seeing it completed is an unexpected behavior.

I've queued the patch and I already said that this is not wrong, but I think your argument cuts it both ways.

I have "co" aliased to "checkout", but with this change "git help co<TAB>" now will interfere with my expectation that it would complete to commit, config and the like, but exclude an alias that I myself defined and know how to spell but forgot what its exact definition was, in order to avoid cluttering the choices offered.

This is a constructive tangent but if we are going to run $(__git_aliases) every time we run _git_help, perhaps it would want a hack similar to the way the value for $__git_all_commands is generated just once?