From: Ben Knoble Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2025 17:45:01 GMT Subject: Re: [rfc] flip rerere.enabled default to be "on" at Git 3.0 boundary? Message-ID: <80220653-7302-4E4D-99E9-1A8CB5B4F23D@gmail.com> In-Reply-To: > Le 22 oct. 2025 à 01:55, Johannes Sixt a écrit : > > Am 21.10.25 um 20:55 schrieb Kristoffer Haugsbakk: >>> On Tue, Oct 21, 2025, at 20:21, Junio C Hamano wrote: >>> A good default matters, and people who find out how useful a rerere >>> database is would say "gee, that sounds great but why they do not >>> enable it by default? It is too buggy and they wanted to reduce the >>> number of support requests?" Yes, the reason it is not enabled by >>> default initially was exactly that, i.e. those opt into the feature >>> was used as guinea pigs to polish the feature. But we forgot to set >>> the graduation criteria and never said "ok it is mature enough, so >>> let's turn it on for everybody". >>> >>> Perhaps Git 3.0 boundary is a good occasion to do so? >> >> This sounds nice. > > While I agree that the rerere cache is a very valuable tool to have, it > has the very sharp edge that a cached wrong resolution is extremely > difficult to get rid of. > > Merge conflicts and how to resolve them correctly is a skill that needs > to be trained. Giving a novice who is still tipping their toes into the > waters of merge resolution the advice to "just enable rerere" exposes > them to a behavior whose results (the reuse of incorrect merge > resolutions that they thought they had already corrected) are > inexplicable without the help of an expert. > > I think I'm saying that I am mildly opposed to enable rerere by default > as long as it has this sharp edge. Fair points. Could I ask an enterprising reader to summarize the sharp edges of rerere that need polished? It could make an effective todo list to aim for prior to 3.0. Here’s what I recall seeing: - messaging is not clear - usage for dealing with incorrect caches needs improvement (should be useable without expert intervention) - as a first step, perhaps having rerere and status display more information about possible steps to take (review results, keep or discard) would help?