Re: Implementing branch attributes in git config

From: Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net>
Date: May 9, 2006, 00:54 UTC
Message-ID: <7virogc90u.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0605081731440.3718@g5.osdl.org>

Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org> writes:

Show 35 quoted lines

> On Mon, 8 May 2006, sean wrote:
>> 
>> One option, which I don't really like and comes with its own set of 
>> problems, would be to do something like:
>> 
>> [branch1]
>>     streetname = "p4/BrAnCH"
>> [branch2]
>>     streetname = "origin"
>
> You don't actually need that.
>
> We could easily do
>
> 	[branch]
> 		name = "p4/BrAnCH"
> 		url = git://git.kernel.org/...
> 		pull = master
>
> 	;
> 	; Repeating the "[branch]" section here isn't
> 	;  needed, but doesn't hurt either, and is
> 	; more readable
> 	;
> 	[branch]
> 		name = "origin"
> 		url = ...
> 		pull = ...
>
> because the config file is always parsed linearly, and just 
> trigger on "branch.name", and keep that around when parsing 
> anything else.
>
> The problem with _that_ is that "git repo-config" can't add this kind of 
> setup sanely: it doesn't understand that kind of statefulness.

Wait a minute...  Statefulness is not the issue, I think.

How would you tell your updated repo-config what to update and what to look up?

	- I want the url for branch whose name is "origin"

	- I want to fetch their "for-linus" branch when fetching
          from the branch whose name is "jgarzik" from now on.

In these query and update, you _are_ naming the branch with name="xxx"; you just made "name" a special attribute.

Now, how would that compare with:

        [branch.jgarzik]
                url = git://git.kernel.org/...
                fetch = for-linus

or
	[branch."JGarzik"]
                url = git://git.kernel.org/...
                fetch = for-linus

I would say if we are grouping things together, if we can give name to each group, _and_ if we are going to refer to the group with its name, we are better off making the groups into distinct sections _and_ make the syntax obvious that what name refers to the section. I think [branch.jgarzik] syntax is more obvious than your example where "name =" line is implicitly used as a keyword to differenciate multiple occurrences of [branch] sections.

Having said that, perhaps you have something more elaborate in mind, e.g.

	repo-config --get branch.url where name = 'origin'
	repo-config --get branch.name where url like 'git://%'
	repo-config branch.url 'git://git.kernel.org/...' where name = foo

;-) ;-) ;-) ??? If that is what you are after, then I agree your syntax is more generic and suitable. But otherwise I fail to see its point.

On a related topic, I have always been torn about the "for" convention. While I think it was a cute hack, it would break quite badly once we start doing anything complex.

	[branch]
        	url = git://git.kernel.org/... for jgarzik
                fetch = for-linus for jgarzik
                proxy = none

        	url = git://git.kernel.org/... for torvalds
                fetch = master for torvalds