Re: [1.8.0] use 'stage' term consistently

> Hi Mark,
>
> Mark Lodato wrote:
>
>> I agree with Felipe that "staging" is the most appropriate term for
>> "adding to the index" in git.  As a native English speaker, I have
>> never thought of "to stage" as relating to shipping in any way.  To
>> me, by far the most common usage is in real estate.  The seller of a
>> home "stages" it by setting up furniture and decorations to make the
>> home as appealing to prospective buyers as possible.
>
> I think staging a home does not fit very well here, actually.  As you
> said, staging a home is like staging a play, creating an illusion and
> putting on a production.  It is not obvious how this concept would
> help me understand what it means to add content to the index.
>
> By contrast, if you run an image search for "staging area", you will
> see examples in all sorts of fields --- shipping, military logistics,
> data warehousing, disaster relief.  It is a familiar, non
> domain-specific term for native English speakers.  In all these
> fields, staging means to put everything needed in one place before
> deploying.  This matches the concept of a file that tracks the content
> of the commit being prepared very well.

>
> "aire de rassemblement" doesn't get as many hits from a web search,
> alas, so I guess the idiom is not as popular in other languages.
>
> For the sake of having a proposal: :)
>
> - the file representing the content of the next command would still
>   be called .git/index and not be renamed
>
> - adding and removing content to and from the index is "staging a
>   change".  Since it is not safe to assume the reader already
>   knows what that means, when working on the manual authors should
>   try to imagine themselves as a new user and make the text
>   unambiguous enough to help such a person.
>
>   For example, the first sentence of the "git add" manual:
>
> This command updates the index using the current content found in the
> working tree, to prepare the content staged for the next commit.
>
>   should not be changed to:
>
> This command updates the staging area using ...
>
>   because that just makes it less clear.  Before, it said "the index"
>   and I could look in the glossary or the .git directory to at least
>   find what file it was talking about.  Afterwards, it is using an
>   everyday term and the new user wonders "which staging area?".
>
>   Instead, it would be better to change it to something like:
>
> This command modifies the content staged for the next commit
> using content found in the working tree.  It typically adds ...
>
> The "index" file (see gitindex(5)) typically holds a snapshot of
> the content of the working tree, and it is this snapshot that is

> taken as the content of the next commit.  Thus after making any
> changes to the working directory, and before running the commit
> command, you must use the add command to add any new or modified
> files.
>
> Sensible?  If so, patches welcome. :)  If not, what sort of changes
> would you like to see instead?
>
> By the way, I don't mean that "the .git/index file will not be
> renamed" above to be non-negotiable.  I didn't get the impression
> anyone wanted it to be renamed, but if someone does want to rename it
> to .git/staging-area, then I suppose we could discuss that.