Re: [RFC] Possibility to choose ~/.config/git/config instead of ~/.gitconfig

Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> writes:

A typical user configuration (or at least mine ;-) ) can include:

[core]
	excludesfile = ~/.gitignore
	attributesfile = ~/.gitattributes

Not having a default value for these two variables is a bit painful. For example, when I teach newbies not to version their *~ backup files, I'd like to grab their keyboard and type for them

  echo '*~' >> ~/.gitignore

but right now, it takes a bit more time than that (which multiplied by 35 students in a room is not negligible ;-) ).

Actually, I now remember trying to find a default value some time ago:

  http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/133343

The conclusion essentially boiled down to "let's drop the patch until there's a clear consensus on what the default value should be", and "don't default to ~/.gitsomething, because it will be painful to migrate to a user config directory later".

Once it's official that the configuration is in stg like ~/.config/git/, we can start thinking about a default value for core.excludesfile and core.attributesfile, in the same directory (note: we're just talking about default values here, so users having set the variable explicitely won't be affected by the change).