Re: svn versus git

From: Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net>
Date: Dec 14, 2006, 09:44 UTC
Message-ID: <7vodq695ha.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net>
In-Reply-To: <200612140908.36952.andyparkins@gmail.com>

Andy Parkins <andyparkins@gmail.com> writes:

Show 11 quoted lines

> On Wednesday 2006 December 13 22:56, Shawn Pearce wrote:
>
>>   git cat-file -p $REV:$file
>>
>> not sure how much easier it gets than that.  Load in the bash
>> completion from contrib/completion and you can even tab complete
>> the $file part.
>
> Yes.  I was a little unfair on that one; I forgot about the REV:file syntax.  
> However, it's still not simple for a new user; I think I'd say "draw" if 
> the "-p" weren't a requirement.

I would say pretending as if cat-file is a Porcelain is the unfair part.

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> $ git-ls-tree v1.0.0
> 100644 blob 906e98492080d2fde9467a9970fc92d7a8cfeaf8    Makefile
>
> I'm a newbie:  what's that number at the front?  What's a blob?  What's that 
> great big number - I've only seen commit hashes that look like that, and that 
> isn't one.  Definitely not friendly.

Again, mistaking ls-tree as if it was a Porcelain is the true cause of the newbie confusion.

> It could probably be fixed by making git-ls-files capable of understanding 
> tree-ish.

I think that's a wrong way to go about. The primary purpose of ls-files is to read the index and show information around it; ls-tree is about reading one tree and show information around it. They are both plumbing and meant to be used by scripts when they want to inspect the index or a tree respectively.

If a Porcelain level "ls" is needed (and I am doubtful about usefulness of "svn list -r538" like command), that is the command you would want to teach about using ls-files and ls-tree depending on what the end users want in their workflow.