Re: [PATCH v3] Enable auto-merge for meld to follow the vim-diff beharior

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Jun 30, 2020, 15:51 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqq1rlwft6q.fsf@gitster.c.googlers.com>
In-Reply-To: <20200630074204.GA2144485@gmail.com>

David Aguilar <davvid@gmail.com> writes:

Show 24 quoted lines

> On Mon, Jun 29, 2020 at 05:06:13PM -0700, Junio C Hamano wrote:
> ...
>> I guess what I am trying to get at is, if --auto-merge is an optional
>> and non-default behaviour for "meld" users, perhaps it is not a good
>> idea to change the behaviour on them only because the version of meld
>> they run happens to support the --auto-merge as an optional behaviour.
>> 
>> IOW, wouldn't it make more sense, and certainly make it safer
>> without surprises to existing users, if we made the logic to
>> 
>>     * If mergetool.meld.useAutoMerge is not set, do not pass
>>       --auto-merge whether "meld" supports the option or not.
>> 
>>     * If mergetool.meld.useAutoMerge is 'true', always pass it
>>       without checking.
>> 
>>     * If mergetool.meld.useAutoMerge is 'when-able' (or come up with
>>       a better name if you want, perhaps 'auto'), check if "meld"
>>       accepts "--auto-merge" and decide whether to pass it or not.
>> 
>> perhaps?
>
> I like the idea of having it be auto/true/false, and perhaps "auto"
> would be a sensible default if more users benefit from it than not.

The principle I've stuck to running this project for the past years is to avoid hurting 1 user more than trying to please 10 others. As I do not use meld regularly myself, I do not know if there are use cases that are helped by the fact that "--auto-merge" is not the default behaviour among "meld" users (not limited to "users of mergetool with meld backend"). And if there are, suddenly changing the behaviour to those who have happily been using mergetool with meld backend that does not "--auto-merge" can be disservice to our users. Until I hear something along the lines of "Even though meld requires --auto-merge from users merely due to historical reasons, these days everybody hates the fact that it is not the default", I'd recommend against making 'auto' the default on our side, just to be safe, even if our intuition is that majority of users may want the "--auto-merge" behaviour.

But I am not a user of mergetool with meld backend, so...

Thanks.