Re: [RFC PATCH] GIT-VERSION-GEN: set --abbrev=9 to match auto-scaling

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Dec 5, 2016, 22:24 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqr35m2eva.fsf@gitster.mtv.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <e74163ee-e7d4-bcbd-e65f-368bc2ee9a2d@ramsayjones.plus.com>

Ramsay Jones <ramsay@ramsayjones.plus.com> writes:

Show 6 quoted lines

> As I said, the original version of the patch just removed the
> --abbrev=7, but then I started to think about why you might have
> used --abbrev in the first place (first in commit 9b88fcef7 and
> again in commit bf505158d). Making sure to override the configuration
> was the only thing I could come up with. So, I was hoping you could
> remember why! :-P

Nope. As a maintainer support script, the only thing I cared about it is that there is no -gXXXX at the end for anything I release ;-)

> (I assumed it was to force a measure of uniformity/reproducibility).

You cannot force uniformity/reproducibility with fixed abbrev, unless you set abbreviation length to 40, so you are correct to add "a measure of" there ;-) The first choice (i.e. 4) may have had a justification to force absolute minimum, and the second one (i.e. 7) may have had a justifiation to make it clear that we are using the same setting as the default, so in post-1.7.10 era, I think it is fine for us to just say "we have been using the same as default, so let's not specify anything explicitly".