Re: Question: behavior when reverting a commit from a shallow clone
- From
Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
- Date
- Oct 5, 2026, 06:57 UTC
- Message-ID
- <asNKYAHSWJkFkhNn@pks.im>
- In-Reply-To
- <54fac5f4-e49b-4384-af2c-615d7cc04ff5@gmx.com>
On Sat, Oct 03, 2026 at 12:41:47PM -0700, Carlisle T. Hamlin wrote:
Show 32 quoted lines
> On 10/3/26 1:54 AM, Sphinx wrote: > > Is the following understanding correct? > > > > An empty tree is a valid Git state, so Git does not generally consider > > transitioning from a non-empty tree to an empty tree inherently > > erroneous. > > > > Git does not have a general safeguard that warns when an operation > > will delete all tracked files. > > > > If there are existing safeguards, warnings, configuration options, or > > historical discussions that I may have missed, I would appreciate any > > pointers. > > > > The reason I am asking is that I am trying to establish precisely > > where Git's safety boundary is in this scenario specifically, whether > > Git itself is expected to warn about the resulting empty tree, or > > whether detecting an unexpectedly destructive tree change is > > considered the responsibility of the tooling performing the operation. > You know, it seems to me that it should be reasonable for Git to assume that > someone with the wherewithal to set up and operate a git repository (or at > the very least operate one that someone else set up) knows enough to > understand what's going to happen if they obliterate the only commit in > their tree. > > There really is only *so* much holding of the hand I think we should be > expected to perform before it's not only insulting to the project > developers, but also to the *user*. > > My two cents. I know folk use Git for all sorts of stuff. Just, maybe... the > sort of person who would be surprised catastrophically by this behaviour... > well... shouldn't.
There really is no need to be this adversarial to a simple question like from the author. We want to be a welcoming community, and replies like this are the exact opposite and will drive people away.
Thanks!
Patrick