Re: Should update-index --refresh force writing the index in case of racy timestamps?

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Dec 18, 2021, 00:08 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqee6a22rj.fsf@gitster.g>
In-Reply-To: <Ybz9ruQ/uOfFbn3W@camp.crustytoothpaste.net>

"brian m. carlson" <sandals@crustytoothpaste.net> writes:

Show 14 quoted lines

> On 2021-12-17 at 10:44:32, Marc Strapetz wrote:
>> For one of my Git-LFS test repositories, switching between branches quite
>> often results in lots of racy index timestamps. Subsequent calls to "git
>> update-index --refresh" or "git status" will invoke the "lfs" filter over
>> and over again, just to figure out that all entries are still up-to-date.
>> Hence, the index will never be rewritten and racy timestamps will remain.
>> 
>> To break out of this state, it seems favorable to write the index if any
>> racy timestamp is detected. We will be able to provide a patch if this
>> change sounds reasonable.
>
> Sure, this sounds reasonable, especially if, as you mentioned, git
> status already does this.  We might as well make the plumbing commands
> as functional as the porcelain commands.

Given that "update-index --refresh" is a way to say "we know something changed to make cached stat information dirty even for otherwise clean paths and we want our 'diff-files' and other plumbing command to start relying on the cached stat information again, so please do as much I/O as you need", I agree that it should do as thourough job as necessary.