Re: [PATCH 0/3] Fixing volatile HEAD in push.default = current

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: May 22, 2013, 14:26 UTC
Message-ID: <7v7girks4s.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <CALkWK0np7o0eH8ZsWQSwk1Cdwnnpj5B==gS8kAE+OkTskASOsQ@mail.gmail.com>

Ramkumar Ramachandra <artagnon@gmail.com> writes:

Show 7 quoted lines

> Why should I lie in the patch?  The terminal flipping was a very big
> itch I had, and the patch fixes exactly that issue.  Showing the real
> branch name was an unintended side-effect.
>
> I just said "early" and showed a nice end-user example in which it
> works, not "theoretically impossible to race with".  Better wording
> (while not lying about the motivation behind the patch)?

The patch may have been done by a wrong motivation, in that it does not fundamentally "fix" the itch. The particular "itch" is not something we are going to promise to the end users, ever, anyway.

The only remaining justification for the change is, even though the user cannot _safely_ flip the branches with this patch, it improves the output.

That does not make the patch wrong, but the original motivation is an irrelevant, lost cause. "Even though this started to address an itch, the patch does not fundamentally fix that itch at all." may be a honest statement to make, but that alone is not a justification to have this change.

The "side effect" is the only improvement this patch gives us, and that happens to be a good enough justification. At that point, is the original itch the patch does not correctly address even worth mentioning? I answered "no" to that question.

So I do not think you are lying anything.