Re: [PATCH 5/5] refs.c: make @ a pseudo-ref alias to HEAD

From: Ramkumar Ramachandra <artagnon@gmail.com>
Date: May 1, 2013, 19:00 UTC
Message-ID: <CALkWK0=WjctcYv30V9b3NMb5motYz=57OqmLU7pdW_fbOP40MA@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <CAMP44s3nzuecoM+h+pNknV4A68R1gZ6DZpehp3uKcJhppXo+1w@mail.gmail.com>

Felipe Contreras wrote:

> Does the user really cares if it's a pseudo-ref or not? Also, what
> does it mean that "refers" to HEAD?

It's not about whether the user cares or not; it's about saying it in a way that doesn't make it less precise. I'm saying "@ is like a symbolic-ref .git/@ ref referring to HEAD, except it doesn't sit on the filesystem".

It's not important that end users understand it fully. It's only really useful in two cases: @~ and @^, and I've provided examples there.

Show 6 quoted lines

>> An '@' followed
>> +    by '\{' has no relationship to this and means something entirely
>> +    different (see below).
>
> If the user cares about that, the user can see that below, otherwise
> there's no point in mentioning that.

A user seeing @{} might vaguely recall @ and scroll-back here. In which case, this is useful.

> Just like there's no point in
> mentioning that @{-N} means something totally different from @{N},
> because the user can see that. If it didn't mean something different,
> this bullet point wouldn't exist.

Those two are right next to each other.