# Re: git tag usability issue: Lightweight vs Annotated confusion for the end user (ex. git describe default)

2 messages from 2013-07-24 to 2013-07-24. Participants: Jonathon Mah, Junio C Hamano.
Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/34529

## Jonathon Mah, 2013-07-24 19:09

Subject: Re: git tag usability issue: Lightweight vs Annotated confusion for the end user (ex. git describe default)
Message-ID: <032D5084-C70F-4F62-8F62-975ADEA56ED6@JonathonMah.com>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/032D5084-C70F-4F62-8F62-975ADEA56ED6%40JonathonMah.com

```
>         Some git command (ex. git describe) by default only consider 
> annotated tags.

I always add --tags when I call git-describe. Is there any reason this shouldn't become the new default (quickly, before git 2.0 perhaps)? I wasn't able to find any reason for the current behavior with just a little digging.



Jonathon Mah
me@JonathonMah.com

```

## Junio C Hamano, 2013-07-24 20:37

Subject: Re: git tag usability issue: Lightweight vs Annotated confusion for the end user (ex. git describe default)
Message-ID: <7vppu766ev.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/7vppu766ev.fsf%40alter.siamese.dyndns.org
In-Reply-To: <032D5084-C70F-4F62-8F62-975ADEA56ED6@JonathonMah.com>

```
Jonathon Mah <me@JonathonMah.com> writes:

> I always add --tags when I call git-describe. Is there any reason this shouldn't become the new default (quickly, before git 2.0 perhaps)?

The distinction is there for a reason--- annotated tags are meant
for the more "public" and "permanent" stuff, while you can do
lightweight tags for random short-term stuff.

An argument could be to change Git not to follow unannotated tags
with "git fetch" and "git push --follow-tags" by default, which goes
in the direction to make the distinction even clear.  But for a
change to make the distinction less useful, I would have to say it
is probably a bad idea.

```