Re: Restore a single file in the index back to HEAD

From: Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net>
Date: Nov 1, 2006, 08:34 UTC
Message-ID: <7vvelz7eg2.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net>
In-Reply-To: <7vpsc78ua3.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net>

Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net> writes:

Show 6 quoted lines

>> I would prefer "git update-index --reset frotz" or "git checkout
>> --index HEAD frotz". git ls-tree|git update-index is too cryptic for
>> me and too long for my fingers.
>
> Then perhaps you can use "git checkout HEAD frotz", which is the
> simplest?

Sorry, Oops.

One should never respond to a message in an ancient thread unless one has enough time to revisit previous messages and refresh one's memory.

The original topic was about updating the index entry without touching working tree, so "co HEAD path" would not do what was wanted.

I think at the UI level, the most appropriate place would be "git reset". Checkout is a Porcelainish that is primarily about working tree and it updates the index as a side effect (from the UI point of view); you can update the working tree without modifying index or you can update both index and the working tree, but updating only index and not working tree does not belong there.

Given a commit that is different from the current HEAD, "reset" moves the HEAD and depending on hardness of the reset it updates the index and the working tree. Currently the command does not take paths limiters and means "the whole tree", but asking to update only one would logically fall as a natural extension to the current command line if we add paths limiters.

As an implementation detail of the new "reset", the ls-tree to update-index pipe could be used.