From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Wed, 29 May 2013 21:15:04 GMT
Subject: Re: [git-users] Highlevel (but simple to implement) commands provided by default for git
Message-ID: <7vtxllqyhz.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <CALkWK0=kA8mPt-8h8dYS9HrOcF1tx=0Pj-=jFHfa_UxdC=ehPQ@mail.gmail.com>

Ramkumar Ramachandra <artagnon@gmail.com> writes:

>>         cd Documentation; git blame :/Makefile
>
> *scratches head*

You lean new things every day ;-).

>   cd Documentation; git blame ../Makefile
>
> Isn't this how pathspecs are specified everywhere?

The whole point of show-cdup is that people (especially those in
java land) bury themselves in a hierarchy so deep that it is not
feasible to tell "Go count the hierarchy and prefix that many ../
yourself" to them.

The answer to "we cannot count ../" issue is ":(top)" aka ":/" magic
pathspec modifier.

"git blame" takes a single pathname, not "a set of patterns to match
against to select concrete paths", which is what a pathspec is.