Re: [PATCH 00/28] Use main as default branch name

From: Sergey Organov <sorganov@gmail.com>
Date: Nov 19, 2020, 11:10 UTC
Message-ID: <871rgpr497.fsf@osv.gnss.ru>
In-Reply-To: <7df660f2-ad74-7d1f-eb13-a0edadffbfbf@iee.email>

Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.email> writes:

Show 14 quoted lines

> On 19/11/2020 01:51, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>> Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.email> writes:
>>
>>> An alternative in the other direction is to go with the 'not currently
>>> on any branch' (detached at nowhere) but then require users to
>>> deliberately create their first branch with their chosen name. This
>>> moves the 'backward incompatibility' to a different place, which may be
>>> easier to manage.
>> As has already been mentioned by Peff, I do not think that is a
>> workable alternative, especially given that people are generally
>> afraid of and easily get confused by being on a detached HEAD.
> Yes, our use of the technical phrase 'detached HEAD' is confusing,
> compared with the more pleasant 'not on any branch', or 'not at a branch
> tip'. Such is the curse of knowledge.

To me "not on a branch [tip]" is also confusing, as in fact you are, as is easily seen after you perform a few commits, and now HEAD points directly to the tip of the branch (that has no other references).

I wonder why Git didn't rather adopt "unnamed branch" or "nameless branch" to describe this mode of operation?

-- Sergey