Re: serious problem with `git format-patch' & `git am'

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Feb 27, 2009, 02:10 UTC
Message-ID: <7viqmwpr2x.fsf@gitster.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <m3ljrsvg0e.fsf@localhost.localdomain>

Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> writes:

> I think you want undocumented but for the git-am usage (e.g. 'git am
> -h') --rebasing option to git-am, which makes git-am preserve Subject:
> line formatting,...

I have to warn that that one requires you to have proper commit object to begin with. IOW, the first line "From [0-9a-f]{40} date" must record an existing object name.

As you said, "am" is for applying e-mailed patches and filter-branch would be the best fit for fixing imported history, but whichever tool is used, I think it is a mistake to try preserving a "one-line-per-paragraph" format the original poster seems to have, i.e.:

   foo foo foo foo
   bar bar bar bar
   baz baz baz baz

Yes, the low-level could create a commit object with a message like that, but all the Porcelains rely on "paragraphs are separated with a blank line" format. So no matter how the conversion is done, I think it would be a good idea to turn the above into:

   foo foo foo foo

   bar bar bar bar
   baz baz baz baz

if the user wants to keep the resulting history any useful.

To do it with "format-patch | am", you would format it like:

	Subject: foo foo foo foo
        From: author name <author.name@domain>
        Date: author date

        bar bar bar bar
        baz baz baz baz