Re: [PATCH 0/7] grep.c: teach --column to 'git-grep(1)'

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Jun 19, 2018, 17:58 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqo9g6vet5.fsf@gitster-ct.c.googlers.com>
In-Reply-To: <20180619174846.GA27820@sigill.intra.peff.net>

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

Show 11 quoted lines

> Although there are interesting cases around inversion. For example:
>
>   git grep --not \( --not -e a --and --not -e b \)
>
> is equivalent to:
>
>   git grep -e a --or -e b
>
> Do people care if we actually hunt down the exact column where we
> _didn't_ match "b" in the first case?  The two are equivalent, but I
> have to wonder if somebody writing the first one really cares.

I may be misunderstanding the question, but I personally would feel that "git grep --not <ANYTHING>" is OK to say "the entire line is at fault that it did not satisify the criteria to match <ANYTHING>". I.e., I'd be happy if --column marked the first column as the beginning of the match, or --color painted the entire line in the output of the former.