Re: git-send-pack SIGSEGV..

Daniel Barkalow <barkalow@iabervon.org> writes:

While I appreciate the proper fix, I have to say "Wait a minute".

First of all, do you really mean MERGE_HEAD in the above? My fix would obviously change the way how "git fetch" would STORE what was fetched when you have "fetch = refs/heads/*" line in the configuration file, which is what I already said in my message. However, using or not using tracking branches to store the result should never affect if the fetched object is used in MERGE_HEAD, so the fix you are responding to should not affect what goes there at all. If it does, then there is something wrong in the current code.

I did not even realize that "push/fetch = $prefix/*" was allowed. IIRC, it has always been "$prefix1/*:$prefix2/*" form, and "$prefix/*" was illegal. Somehow a change in sematics sneaked in without me knowing that makes it legal, and the updated semantics is that for push "$prefix/*" is the same as listing every ref under the prefix (without any colon, so it pushes to the same name), and for fetch "$prefix/*" is the same as $prefix/$x: (i.e. with colon and empty RHS) for all refs under $prefix.

Now, I am not opposed to _having_ enhanced semantics. Earlier, "$prefix/*" was illegal, so it is not like you have introduced any incompatibility. On the push side, I do not think of any sane interpretation for it other than treating it exactly as "$prefix/*:$prefix/*". On the fetch side, however, I am not sure not to use any tracking _and_ grabbing everything is a sane semantics. You fetch everything under $prefix/ and list them in FETCH_HEAD --- now what? On the other handl, treating it as if the user wrote "$prefix/*:$prefix/*" makes some sense. It is a natural operation to keep a bare mirroring repository up to date.

But I am somewhat upset about us having the enhanced semantics without me knowing. I see two possible reasons for it: (1) I was not being extra careful when I accepted your patches, and (2) the change in the semantics were not documented, either in the log nor Documentation/.

We obviously cannot fix (1) overnight, but could you please at least fix (2)? git-push.txt and pull-fetch-param.txt would be the two places that talk about "$prefix1/*:$prefix2/*", and they should talk about the new "$prefix/*" syntax as well.

I think "fetch = refs/heads/*" syntax, if it just fetches without storing, does not make much sense. In a separate-remote repository, "[remote "foo"] fetch = refs/heads/*" would probably be useful if we treated it as "refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/foo/*". In a bare repository used for mirrors, it would be useful if it stood for "refs/heads/*:refs/heads/*".