Re: avoiding fetching specific refs from a remote

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Aug 5, 2020, 16:22 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqq1rkloyeg.fsf@gitster.c.googlers.com>
In-Reply-To: <20200805063704.GA2690083@coredump.intra.peff.net>

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

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>> Essentially, because both main and master have similar names, tab
>> completion requires remembering to type one additional character than
>> I am used to.
>
> Heh, I didn't think anybody considered that implication so far; the fact
> that they were similar names has generally been considered a positive. I
> agree it would be annoying.

FWIW, I've been saying that 'maint' will become harder to type all along ever since I heard 'main'.

https://lore.kernel.org/git/xmqqtuz9tq30.fsf@gitster.c.googlers.com/

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> This is definitely a reasonable thing to want, and it has come up off
> and on over the years. One search term for the list archive is "negative
> refspecs", though it turns up a lot of useless hits when the two words
> are not directly adjacent.
>
> This old thread might be worth reading:
>
>   https://lore.kernel.org/git/20140124090104.GA396@x4/
>
> and there is even a patch in there:
>
>   https://lore.kernel.org/git/20140125013433.GA22336@sigill.intra.peff.net/
>
> but I didn't go over it carefully enough to know whether it is utter
> trash, or something that could be used as a starting point.

I think the idea is interesting. I sometimes find negative pathspecs quite useful, and I suspect negative refspecs would also be.