Re: [PATCH v5 5/7] builtin/grep.c: add '--column' option to 'git-grep(1)'

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: May 12, 2018, 05:08 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqbmdlfokf.fsf@gitster-ct.c.googlers.com>
In-Reply-To: <20180512032733.GA65308@syl.local>

Taylor Blau <me@ttaylorr.com> writes:

Show 12 quoted lines

>>     $ git grep -v second
>>     $ git grep --not -e second
>>
>> may hit all lines in this message (except for the obvious two
>> lines), but we cannot say which column we found a hit.  I am
>> wondering if it is too grave a sin to report "the whole line is what
>> satisfied the criteria given" and say the match lies at column #1.
>
> I think that is sensible. I previously was opposed to this because I
> thought that it would be too difficult to script around the 'sometimes
> we have columns but other times not' and 'I gave --column' but have to
> check whether or not they are really there.

I am not sure if you really got what I meant. I am suggesting that "git grep -v --column second" should report that the entire line has hit for each and every line that does not have "second" on it, which is a good answer and eliminate "sometimes there is column answer (or answer to -o query) and sometimes not" at the same time.

Show 5 quoted lines

> In other terms:
>
>   * not giving '--column' will _never_ give a column,
>   * '--column --invert' will _always_ die(), and
>   * '--column --[and | or | not]' will _never_ give a column.

So this is completely opposite from what I would have expected. to somebody who said "I think that is sensible." over there.