Re: [PATCH 4/6] Documentation/git-merge.txt: improve short description in NAME

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Oct 5, 2016, 17:52 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqa8eiptt2.fsf@gitster.mtv.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <a33dd3ec3da0dc2dad72ed85edd29ff01f898831.1475678515.git.sorganov@gmail.com>

sorganov@gmail.com writes:

Show 22 quoted lines

> From: Sergey Organov <sorganov@gmail.com>
>
> Old description not only raised the question of why the tool is called
> git-merge rather than git-join, but "join histories" also sounds like
> very simple operation, something like what "git-merge -s ours" does.
>
> Signed-off-by: Sergey Organov <sorganov@gmail.com>
> ---
>  Documentation/git-merge.txt | 3 ++-
>  1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>
> diff --git a/Documentation/git-merge.txt b/Documentation/git-merge.txt
> index 216d2f4..cc0329d 100644
> --- a/Documentation/git-merge.txt
> +++ b/Documentation/git-merge.txt
> @@ -3,7 +3,8 @@ git-merge(1)
>  
>  NAME
>  ----
> -git-merge - Join two or more development histories together
> +
> +git-merge - Merge one or more branches to the current branch

This patch, evaluated by itself, looks like a regression in that it tries to explain "merge" by using verb "merge", making it fuzzier to those who do not yet know what a "merge" is. That was why it tried to explain "merge" as an operation to join histories.

However, the next one, 5/6, resurrects the "join history" in the description part to help them, so the damage is not so severe when we take them together.

I haven't formed firm opinion on this patch yet.