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How to `git blame` individual characters?

From
Jan Keromnes <janx@linux.com>
Date
Mar 27, 2018, 00:18 UTC
Message-ID
<CAA6PgK7L04VoHT7A8M_mwq5kA+9BiQxrd6iPjPHOpa4=Z3futw@mail.gmail.com>
Dear Git developers,

I'd like to understand what would be required to run `git blame` on individual characters instead of full lines. Could you please point me in the right direction?

Someone asked a similar question about "Word-by-word blame/annotate" on StackOverflow a few years ago, and one of the replies said:

> Git tracks changes snapshot by snapshot. The line-based format is calculated on-the-fly, and it would also be possible to have a word-based format.
Source: https://stackoverflow.com/q/17758008/3461173

This leaves me hopeful that a character-based format can somehow be achieved. Here is a fake example to illustrate what I'm looking for:

        $ cat myscript.js
        for (int foo = 0; foo <= 11; foo++) { console.log(foo); }
        $ git blame --character-based --pseudo-json myscript.js
        [
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": "for (int " },
            { "commit": "bcd1234a", "summary": "Rename iterator",
"characters": "foo" },
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": " = 0; " },
            { "commit": "bcd1234a", "summary": "Rename iterator",
"characters": "foo" },
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": " <= " },
            { "commit": "cd1234ab", "summary": "Go up to 11",
"characters": "11" },
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": "; " },
            { "commit": "bcd1234a", "summary": "Rename iterator",
"characters": "foo" },
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": "++) { console.log(" },
            { "commit": "bcd1234a", "summary": "Rename iterator",
"characters": "foo" },
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": ")" },
            { "commit": "d1234abc", "summary": "Add missing
semicolon", "characters": ";" },
            { "commit": "abcd1234", "summary": "Implement loop",
"characters": " }" }
        ]

What would be the most direct way to achieve such a character-based blame/annotate? Should I write some sort of Git extension, or hack into Git's source code?

E.g. I looked for an option in `git-blame` or `git-annotate` to change the "next line boundary" from "carret return" (line-based blame) to "any whitespace" (word-based blame) or "character-by-character" (character-based blame), but I didn't find it. Could this be implemented in `blame.c`? If so, which methods would need tweaking?

Many thanks! Jan

Next: Christian Couder
Message 1 of 2 in “How to `git blame` individual characters?”
  1. Jan KeromnesMar 27, 2018
  2. Christian CouderMar 27, 2018

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