Re: Strange behaviour of git log --follow

From: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com>
Date: Mar 28, 2019, 13:16 UTC
Message-ID: <87zhpf9m10.fsf@evledraar.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <web-54136765@mx30.intranet.ru>

On Thu, Mar 28 2019, Victor wrote:

Show 24 quoted lines

> Hello.
>
> $ git log include/__vic/mutex.h
> commit 9429293f8f8fb0819c77cf1f723567f6edc8fb6a
> Merge: 96dd9a2 f484f4e
> Author: __vic <__vic@ngs.ru>
> Date: 2017-12-13 10:41:32 +0300
>
>     Merge branch 'generic' into posix
>
> commit f484f4e8aae32041ba56bdce12d1efd8491e94d5
> Merge: 86b848a b9bbbe6
> Author: __vic <__vic@ngs.ru>
> Date: 2017-12-12 17:35:10 +0300
>
>     waitable_event, thread, mutex
> $ git log --follow include/__vic/mutex.h
> $
>
> Why --follow makes git produce truncated history for file that wasn't
> renamed?
>
> My repository is available here
> https://github.com/2underscores-vic/__vic

I just briefly looked at this. It's because all changes to the relevant file are in merge commits. If you run the "log" with "--stat" you'll see no output.

Something in the --follow machinery takes the same shortcut on merges and doesn't consider them.