git status always modifies index?

Current code appears to always attempt an index refresh, which results in file permission changes if you run a 'git status' as a privileged account.

Would be nice if there were an option available to ask git status to NOT update the index.

Even better would be if it was smart about the situation and would not refresh the index if it can see that file ownership would change as a result of updating the index. To me this is following principle of least surprise. Running a "query" operation would not normally be expected to result in write/modify activity.

-- Nathan ------------------------------------------------------------ Nathan Neulinger nneul@neulinger.org Neulinger Consulting (573) 612-1412