Re: [PATCH 1/2] cat-file doc: document that -e will return some output

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Jan 10, 2018, 21:38 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqtvvtz95g.fsf@gitster.mtv.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <20180110125554.12582-2-avarab@gmail.com>

Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason  <avarab@gmail.com> writes:

Show 12 quoted lines

> The -e option added in 7950571ad7 ("A few more options for
> git-cat-file", 2005-12-03) has always errored out with message on
> stderr saying that the provided object is malformed, currently:
>
>     $ git cat-file -e malformed; echo $?
>     fatal: Not a valid object name malformed
>     128
>
> A careful reader of this documentation would be mislead into thinking
> the could write:
>
>     if ! git cat-file -e "$object" [...]

It is arguable if such a reader is careful or careless. I'd rather drop s/careful // there ;-)

Show 11 quoted lines

> As opposed to:
>
>     if ! git cat-file -e "$object" 2>/dev/null [...]
>
> To check whether some arbitrary $object string was both valid, and
> pointed to an object that exists.
>
> Signed-off-by: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com>
> ---
>  Documentation/git-cat-file.txt | 7 ++++---
>  1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)