Re: [RFC] pull/fetch rename

From: Daniel Barkalow <barkalow@iabervon.org>
Date: Oct 20, 2009, 23:56 UTC
Message-ID: <alpine.LNX.2.00.0910201912390.14365@iabervon.org>
In-Reply-To: <200910201947.50423.trast@student.ethz.ch>

On Tue, 20 Oct 2009, Thomas Rast wrote:

Show 10 quoted lines

> Hi all,
> 
> While everyone is busy in two other UI threads, I figured I might as
> well toss up another (probably) controversial topic.
> 
> Especially on IRC, we see many people who are some combination of
> misunderstanding, misusing or overusing git-pull.  I figure this is
> the result of several factors, notably
> 
> a) pull/push are not symmetric,

In a certain sense they are; they both update the branches local to one repository with the data from the other repository. In this sense, fetch is the oddity in that it doesn't update any repository's own branches, but just the local information about other repositories' branches.

In another sense, push is unlike anything else in that it updates something that's remote; in a third sense, pull is unique in that it can generate a merge.

I suspect that what we've called "fetch" isn't what the people want when they type "pull", either. And I suspect that the fundamental issue is that the operation people are looking for is not the operation that they would do best to use, regardless of naming. I think users are looking for something that corresponds to "svn up", and they find "git pull"; this isn't going to make them happy git users, but finding "git fetch" instead is going to make them even more confused.

But I don't really know; are there IRC logs you can quote or reference with people making the mistake you're trying to help them avoid?

	-Daniel
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