Re: name-ref on annotated-tags is null terminated, but lightweight tags arent

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Jun 5, 2020, 17:04 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqa71ho34p.fsf@gitster.c.googlers.com>
In-Reply-To: <20200605165109.jr6mjl6xz7upofdy@forgemax.local>

Max Resnick <max.resnick@forgerock.com> writes:

> What did you do before the bug happened? (Steps to reproduce your issue)
> I was using name-rev to resolve a commits tag name. Annotated tags seem
> to have a null termination and lightweight tags dont.

Show 8 quoted lines

> ❯ git name-rev --tag --name-only
> 38bdebc9107cab4ab3718d0581632702e74d9209
> annotated-tag^0
>
> /tmp/null-termination-issue on  master
> ❯ git name-rev --tag --name-only
> a340894d3ee655ae6c336a85b42d2215d52609e3
> lightweight-tag

Presumably the long hexadecimal are supposed to be on the same line as the "name-rev" command itself?

There is nothing broken in the above output. The anotated tag (annotated-tag in your example) is an object that merely points at another object (in which case, the object whose name is 38bdebc9, which I guess would be a commit) and it itself has an object name different from 38bdebc9. The suffix "^0" (which has nothing to do with null-termination) means "I do not mean the tag object itself, but the object that is pointed by it".

On the other hand, your lightweight-tag is directly pointing at the object a340894d, so saying "lightweight-tag" is sufficient, as there is no extra layer of indirection (i.e. a tag object) involved.

Hope it helps.