Re: possible usability issue in rebase -i?
2009/10/27 Erik Faye-Lund <kusmabite@googlemail.com>:
Show 34 quoted lines
> On Tue, Oct 27, 2009 at 4:17 PM, Baz <brian.ewins@gmail.com> wrote:
>> I've got a somewhat related minor usability issue with rebase -i. I
>> accidentally typed something like 'git rebase -i -z' and got this
>> message:
>>
>> error: unknown switch `z'
>> usage: git-rebase [-i] [options] [--] <upstream> [<branch>]
>> or: git-rebase [-i] (--continue | --abort | --skip)
>>
>> Available options are
>> -v, --verbose display a diffstat of what changed upstream
>> --onto ... rebase onto given branch instead of upstream
>> -p, --preserve-merges
>> try to recreate merges instead of ignoring them
>> -s, --strategy ... use the given merge strategy
>> -m, --merge always used (no-op)
>> -i, --interactive always used (no-op)
>>
>> The last two lines were the surprise. It suggested to me that '-i' and
>> '-m' were now the defaults for git-rebase - which of course they're
>> not. A user would not know that this is actually reporting the flags
>> that work for git-rebase--interactive, especially since that's not
>> what the command calls itself. I wasn't sure about the best approach
>> to fixing this - the only comparable commands that pass arbitrary
>> flags down to an exec'd program make it clear what program is going to
>> be called (usually git merge) and so interpreting errors is easier.
>>
>> It seems the intent here was to signal that the flags are different
>> once a rebase is in progress, but this usage message is shown when
>> rebase -i -z is called in any state.
>
> If that is the case, my instinct tells me that this information should
> be reflected in the usage-string (instead of the parameter
> description). Something like this?
I'm fine with this way of fixing it, but I'd make a few more changes...
Show 11 quoted lines
>
> --->8---
>
> diff --git a/git-rebase--interactive.sh b/git-rebase--interactive.sh
> index 23ded48..3ed5f94 100755
> --- a/git-rebase--interactive.sh
> +++ b/git-rebase--interactive.sh
> @@ -13,15 +13,15 @@
> OPTIONS_KEEPDASHDASH=
> OPTIONS_SPEC="\
> git-rebase [-i] [options] [--] <upstream> [<branch>]
Use the dashless form and be more consistent with the help - and mention '--root' here, it appears in the help below:
-git-rebase [-i] [options] [--] <upstream> [<branch>] +git rebase [--interactive | -i] [options] [--onto <newbase>] [--] <upstream> [<branch>] +git rebase [--interactive | -i] [options] --onto <newbase> --root [--] [<branch>]
> -git-rebase [-i] (--continue | --abort | --skip)
> +git-rebase [-i] [-m] (--continue | --abort | --skip)
Again, dashless. And I'd not mention the useless -i here, the man page doesn't either:
-git-rebase [-i] (--continue | --abort | --skip) +git rebase (--continue | --abort | --skip)
Show 10 quoted lines
> --
> Available options are
> v,verbose display a diffstat of what changed upstream
> onto= rebase onto given branch instead of upstream
> p,preserve-merges try to recreate merges instead of ignoring them
> s,strategy= use the given merge strategy
> -m,merge always used (no-op)
> -i,interactive always used (no-op)
> +m,merge use merging strategies
> +i,interactive interactively edit commits
These two items are misplaced in the help (I think). They're not like abort, continue, skip, but then, the man page doesn't group those separately either.
+no-verify override pre-rebase hook from stopping the operation +root rebase all reachable commmits up to the root(s)
> Actions:
> continue continue rebasing process
> abort abort rebasing process and restore original branch
As above, remove the next two lines after your patch:
-no-verify override pre-rebase hook from stopping the operation -root rebase all reachable commmits up to the root(s)
-Baz
>
> --
> Erik "kusma" Faye-Lund
>
Erik Faye-Lund
