Re: [PATCH Outreachy] mru: use double-linked list from list.h

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Sep 30, 2017, 00:07 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqq7ewhvyjq.fsf@gitster.mtv.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <20170929233723.c7ixg5fb3flbgaom@sigill.intra.peff.net>

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

> Yes, I think we could just call this "list_move_to_front()" or
> something. The fact that it's operating on a list called
> "packed_git_mru" is probably sufficient to make it clear that the
> purpose is managing recentness.

I earlier said I wasn't sure, but I fully agree with your envisioned endgame state, my understanding of which is that we will not have an API that is only to be used to manage a MRU list (hence there will be no mru.[ch] in that future), as there is very small MRU-specific operation to be offered anyway. Namely, mru_mark() that is to be used to "mark the fact that the item was used---do whatever necessary to maintain the MRU list".

Instead, everybody understands how the list API works, and the fact that one instance of list_head is called MRU is sufficient to see that use of "move this to the front of the list" function means we are marking the item as most-recently-used.

Thanks.