Re: [PATCH] ls-files: respect 'submodule.recurse' config

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Sep 11, 2020, 19:19 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqk0x0nmto.fsf@gitster.c.googlers.com>
In-Reply-To: <45EB4E9E-1819-41D6-839E-A3812456478C@gmail.com>

Philippe Blain <levraiphilippeblain@gmail.com> writes:

> I understand, but I would argue that such a user could easily adapt their
> script to add '--no-recurse-submodules' to their ls-files invocation if that 
> is the case, no ?

It would have been quite a different story if we were designing "ls-files" and adding support for "--[no-]recurse-submodules" and "submodule.recurse" to the command at the same time. To those who write scripts with "ls-files" and complain that the command behaves differently depending on the configuration, you can legitimately say "you can use --no-recurse-submodules and you are fine" in that case.

But not after all these years. The same statement becomes "even if I broke the command, users could work around the breakage I caused". That is nothing more than a lame excuse that does not explay why you think you have the right to break their script in the first place.

So, no, I am not enthused to see this change. Regardless of which configuration variable affects the feature. For those who wrote and use scripts that run ls-files, it is a regression to invite unneeded complaints from their end-users who suddenly see the breakage in the scripts.