Re: [PATCH v9 11/11] Documentation: add documentation for 'git interpret-trailers'

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Apr 4, 2014, 22:42 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqk3b4ogwu.fsf@gitster.dls.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <xmqqob0gohc2.fsf@gitster.dls.corp.google.com>

Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> writes:

Show 13 quoted lines

> Christian Couder <christian.couder@gmail.com> writes:
> ...
>>> Why support both '=' and ':'?  Using just one would make it easier to
>>> grep through scripts to see who is adding signoffs.
>>
>> That was already discussed previously.
>
> I do recall it was discussed previously, but given that a new reader
> posed the same question, I am not sure if the end result in this
> patch under discussion sufficiently answers the question in a
> satisfactory way.
>
> Thanks.

Sorry, I sent out only a half-response before finishing.

>> The reason is that people are used to "token=value" for command line
>> arguments, but trailers appears in the result as "token: value", so it
>> is better for the user if we support both.

While I do understand the part before ", so" on the second line, I do not see why that leads to the conclusion at all.

Yes, because it is a well-established convention to separate option name with its parameter with '=', accepting "--option=parameter" makes sense. That may result in a string "Option: parameter" added to the output from the command. I am not sure why that output has anything to do with how the command line should be specified.