From: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 19:00:33 GMT
Subject: Re: latest blob date (request)
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0601161055300.13339@g5.osdl.org>
In-Reply-To: <20060115173100.1134256b.rdunlap@xenotime.net>



On Sun, 15 Jan 2006, Randy.Dunlap wrote:
> 
> I would find it helpful (a user optimization) if each tree list
> contained a date-last-modified/updated.  This could be used
> to help decide if I (someone) wanted to click on a particular
> blob or history (OK, blobs are quick, but history can be
> very time-consuming, so being able to shortcut or skip
> history would be very helpful IMO).

That's fundamentally a very expensive operation in git.

A "blob" doesn't have a date - and indeed, it cannot have one, since the 
same blob may be associated with multiple different pathnames, and 
multiple different commits.

If you have a particular pathname, you can ask "when was this pathname 
changed last", which is basically

	git-rev-list --max-count=1 HEAD -- Makefile 

but that's not very cheap either.

		Linus