threads / patch / 41485

patchpush: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

Subject: [PATCH] push: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

## tl;dr

11 messages between Feb 23, 2016 and Feb 26, 2016. Diffs are folded; open one to read it.

replies: 10people: 5as markdown or json

Matthieu Moy· Feb 23, 2016, 14:59 UTC · lore
From: Matthieu Moy <matthieu.moy@imag.fr>

The warning was purposely long, both to explain the situation properly and to give a strong incentive to set push.default explicitly. This was important before the 2.0 transition, and remained important for a while after, so that new users get push.default explicitly in their configuration and do not experience inconsistent behavior if they ever used an older version of Git.

The warning has been there since version 1.8.0 (Oct 2012), hence we can expect the vast majority of current Git users to have been exposed to it, and most of them have already set push.default explicitly. The switch from 'matching' to 'simple' was planned for 2.0 (May 2014), but actually happened only for 2.3 (Feb 2015).

The warning is mostly seen by beginners, who have not set their push.default configuration (yet). For many of them, the warning is confusing because it talks about concepts that they have not learned and asks them a choice that they are not able to make yet. See for example

  http://stackoverflow.com/questions/13148066/warning-push-default-is-unset-its-implicit-value-is-changing-in-git-2-0
(1260 votes for the question, 1824 for the answer as of writing)

Shorten the warning and mention only the way to remove the warning without changing the behavior. Keep a pointer to the documentation so that people willing to learn can still find the alternative behaviors easily.

Eventually, the warning should be removed completely, but this can wait a couple more releases or years.

Signed-off-by: Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
---
 builtin/push.c | 20 +++-----------------
 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 17 deletions(-)
Show changes to builtin/push.c +3 −18
diff --git a/builtin/push.c b/builtin/push.c
index 960ffc3..00eba2f 100644
--- a/builtin/push.c
+++ b/builtin/push.c
@@ -205,26 +205,12 @@ static void setup_push_current(struct remote *remote, struct branch *branch)
 }
 
 static char warn_unspecified_push_default_msg[] =
-N_("push.default is unset; its implicit value has changed in\n"
-   "Git 2.0 from 'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message\n"
-   "and maintain the traditional behavior, use:\n"
-   "\n"
-   "  git config --global push.default matching\n"
-   "\n"
-   "To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior now, use:\n"
+N_("push.default is unset; its default value has changed in Git 2.0 from\n"
+   "'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior, use:\n"
    "\n"
    "  git config --global push.default simple\n"
    "\n"
-   "When push.default is set to 'matching', git will push local branches\n"
-   "to the remote branches that already exist with the same name.\n"
-   "\n"
-   "Since Git 2.0, Git defaults to the more conservative 'simple'\n"
-   "behavior, which only pushes the current branch to the corresponding\n"
-   "remote branch that 'git pull' uses to update the current branch.\n"
-   "\n"
-   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further information.\n"
-   "(the 'simple' mode was introduced in Git 1.7.11. Use the similar mode\n"
-   "'current' instead of 'simple' if you sometimes use older versions of Git)");
+   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further information.");
 
 static void warn_unspecified_push_default_configuration(void)
 {

--
https://github.com/git/git/pull/201
Junio C Hamano· Feb 23, 2016, 19:05 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

Re: [PATCH] push: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr> writes:
Show 8 quoted lines
> The warning is mostly seen by beginners, who have not set their
> push.default configuration (yet). For many of them, the warning is
> confusing because it talks about concepts that they have not learned and
> asks them a choice that they are not able to make yet. See for example
>
>   http://stackoverflow.com/questions/13148066/warning-push-default-is-unset-its-implicit-value-is-changing-in-git-2-0
>
> (1260 votes for the question, 1824 for the answer as of writing)
The punchline of that question is:
    I can obviously set it to one of the values mentioned, but what do
    they mean? What's the difference between simple and matching?

It tells us that "See 'git help config'" is not such an effective message to help such a user.

> Shorten the warning and mention only the way to remove the warning
> without changing the behavior. Keep a pointer to the documentation so
> that people willing to learn can still find the alternative behaviors
> easily.

While I admit that I usually am the most cautious one when dealing with any change, I am not sure if this rephrasing helps very much. As we saw, the sentence you kept, "See 'git help config'", is not effective in helping those stackoverflow users. Removal of the other parts of the message the patch does does make sense, as we know these users do not read, so they are merely noisy black pixels on the screen.

If most people are happy with "simple" (and certainly that was the assumption and hope behind the transtion we made at 2.0), we may be better off removing the warning altogether. Keeping "and adopt the new behaviour" part pretends to be offering a chance to make an informed choice, but it will forever be unclear to the non-reader what the implication of not adopting the new behaviour is anyway, so overall we won't see reduced hits at stackoverflow with this change.

After all, push.default configuration is hardly the only case where there are other ways to use Git that may match the user's situation better, and we do not advertise "Oh by the way you can do things differently, study the manual" for any of them with a warning message like this. Those who want to do different things know to seek settings to tweak.

The above analysis considers _only_ those who go to stackoverflow. For those who do read, perhaps "See 'git config help'" may have some value, but again, many aspects of the system can be tweaked, and we do not advertise that everywhere, so...

> Eventually, the warning should be removed completely, but this can wait
> a couple more releases or years.
Show 42 quoted lines
> Signed-off-by: Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
> ---
>  builtin/push.c | 20 +++-----------------
>  1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 17 deletions(-)
>
> diff --git a/builtin/push.c b/builtin/push.c
> index 960ffc3..00eba2f 100644
> --- a/builtin/push.c
> +++ b/builtin/push.c
> @@ -205,26 +205,12 @@ static void setup_push_current(struct remote *remote, struct branch *branch)
>  }
>  
>  static char warn_unspecified_push_default_msg[] =
> -N_("push.default is unset; its implicit value has changed in\n"
> -   "Git 2.0 from 'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message\n"
> -   "and maintain the traditional behavior, use:\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "  git config --global push.default matching\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior now, use:\n"
> +N_("push.default is unset; its default value has changed in Git 2.0 from\n"
> +   "'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior, use:\n"
>     "\n"
>     "  git config --global push.default simple\n"
>     "\n"
> -   "When push.default is set to 'matching', git will push local branches\n"
> -   "to the remote branches that already exist with the same name.\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "Since Git 2.0, Git defaults to the more conservative 'simple'\n"
> -   "behavior, which only pushes the current branch to the corresponding\n"
> -   "remote branch that 'git pull' uses to update the current branch.\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further information.\n"
> -   "(the 'simple' mode was introduced in Git 1.7.11. Use the similar mode\n"
> -   "'current' instead of 'simple' if you sometimes use older versions of Git)");
> +   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further information.");
>  
>  static void warn_unspecified_push_default_configuration(void)
>  {
>
> --
> https://github.com/git/git/pull/201
Matthieu Moy· Feb 23, 2016, 19:47 UTC · re: Junio C Hamano · lore

Re: [PATCH] push: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> writes:
Show 7 quoted lines
> The punchline of that question is:
>
>     I can obviously set it to one of the values mentioned, but what do
>     they mean? What's the difference between simple and matching?
>
> It tells us that "See 'git help config'" is not such an effective
> message to help such a user.
[ The teacher inside me speaks ]

Don't underestimate the ability to ignore any pointer to the doc from many users.

In many case, when a student comes to me scared about an error or warning message, I just ask the student to read the message to me. If it's in english, I sometimes have to add "so, what does this mean in French", and in many cases it's sufficient.

Show 9 quoted lines
>> Shorten the warning and mention only the way to remove the warning
>> without changing the behavior. Keep a pointer to the documentation so
>> that people willing to learn can still find the alternative behaviors
>> easily.
>
> While I admit that I usually am the most cautious one when dealing
> with any change, I am not sure if this rephrasing helps very much.
> As we saw, the sentence you kept, "See 'git help config'", is not
> effective in helping those stackoverflow users.

Right. But assuming someone who reads the complete message, I found that keeping only the first lines without a pointer to the doc make the text kind of mysterious:

  warning: push.default is unset; its default value has changed in Git 2.0 from
  'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior, use:
  
    git config --global push.default simple

Alone, this really looks like a magic formula like "I'm showing you this warning just to bug you, but you can get rid of it with ...".

> If most people are happy with "simple" (and certainly that was the
> assumption and hope behind the transtion we made at 2.0), we may be
> better off removing the warning altogether.

To me, this is the plan. I have no strong objection in removing it completely, but I think it makes sense to keep a lightweight one for a while: if people use different machines with different Git versions (especially if they ever use a version in the interval 2.0 to 2.3 which claims to use simple but actually do not), then these people may appreciate an incentive to set push.default.

OTOH, if they use different Git versions, they will eventually get the message.

Show 6 quoted lines
> After all, push.default configuration is hardly the only case where
> there are other ways to use Git that may match the user's situation
> better, and we do not advertise "Oh by the way you can do things
> differently, study the manual" for any of them with a warning
> message like this.  Those who want to do different things know to
> seek settings to tweak.
I completely agree with this.
-- 
Matthieu Moy
http://www-verimag.imag.fr/~moy/
Jeff King· Feb 24, 2016, 10:11 UTC · re: Junio C Hamano · lore

Re: [PATCH] push: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 11:05:08AM -0800, Junio C Hamano wrote:
Show 7 quoted lines
> If most people are happy with "simple" (and certainly that was the
> assumption and hope behind the transtion we made at 2.0), we may be
> better off removing the warning altogether.  Keeping "and adopt the
> new behaviour" part pretends to be offering a chance to make an
> informed choice, but it will forever be unclear to the non-reader
> what the implication of not adopting the new behaviour is anyway, so
> overall we won't see reduced hits at stackoverflow with this change.

Yeah, this was my first thought on seeing Matthieu's patch. We inserted that message to tell people about the impending change, and to catch any stragglers even after the change had happened. At some point it simply becomes obsolete history.

I dunno if that time is now or not. v2.3.0 (which actually flipped the switch) is only a year old, but we've been showing the message since v1.8.0, which is over 3 years old. Even Debian stable is way beyond that. :)

So my inclination is to just rip out the warning entirely.
-Peff
Philip Oakley· Feb 23, 2016, 20:35 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

Re: [PATCH] push: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

From: "Matthieu Moy" <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
Show 23 quoted lines
> From: Matthieu Moy <matthieu.moy@imag.fr>
>
> The warning was purposely long, both to explain the situation properly
> and to give a strong incentive to set push.default explicitly. This was
> important before the 2.0 transition, and remained important for a while
> after, so that new users get push.default explicitly in their
> configuration and do not experience inconsistent behavior if they ever
> used an older version of Git.
>
> The warning has been there since version 1.8.0 (Oct 2012), hence we can
> expect the vast majority of current Git users to have been exposed to
> it, and most of them have already set push.default explicitly. The
> switch from 'matching' to 'simple' was planned for 2.0 (May 2014), but
> actually happened only for 2.3 (Feb 2015).
>
> The warning is mostly seen by beginners, who have not set their
> push.default configuration (yet). For many of them, the warning is
> confusing because it talks about concepts that they have not learned and
> asks them a choice that they are not able to make yet. See for example
>
> 
> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/13148066/warning-push-default-is-unset-its-implicit-value-is-changing-in-git-2-0
>

Shouldn't this also update the 'push' man page to state what the new default is. @gerry's comment to the top answer http://stackoverflow.com/a/13148313/717355 highlights that the word 'simple' is not even mentioned in the 'push' man page.

Show 66 quoted lines
> (1260 votes for the question, 1824 for the answer as of writing)
>
> Shorten the warning and mention only the way to remove the warning
> without changing the behavior. Keep a pointer to the documentation so
> that people willing to learn can still find the alternative behaviors
> easily.
>
> Eventually, the warning should be removed completely, but this can wait
> a couple more releases or years.
>
> Signed-off-by: Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
> ---
> builtin/push.c | 20 +++-----------------
> 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 17 deletions(-)
>
> diff --git a/builtin/push.c b/builtin/push.c
> index 960ffc3..00eba2f 100644
> --- a/builtin/push.c
> +++ b/builtin/push.c
> @@ -205,26 +205,12 @@ static void setup_push_current(struct remote 
> *remote, struct branch *branch)
> }
>
> static char warn_unspecified_push_default_msg[] =
> -N_("push.default is unset; its implicit value has changed in\n"
> -   "Git 2.0 from 'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message\n"
> -   "and maintain the traditional behavior, use:\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "  git config --global push.default matching\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior now, use:\n"
> +N_("push.default is unset; its default value has changed in Git 2.0 
> from\n"
> +   "'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message and adopt the new 
> behavior, use:\n"
>    "\n"
>    "  git config --global push.default simple\n"
>    "\n"
> -   "When push.default is set to 'matching', git will push local 
> branches\n"
> -   "to the remote branches that already exist with the same name.\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "Since Git 2.0, Git defaults to the more conservative 'simple'\n"
> -   "behavior, which only pushes the current branch to the 
> corresponding\n"
> -   "remote branch that 'git pull' uses to update the current branch.\n"
> -   "\n"
> -   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further 
> information.\n"
> -   "(the 'simple' mode was introduced in Git 1.7.11. Use the similar 
> mode\n"
> -   "'current' instead of 'simple' if you sometimes use older versions of 
> Git)");
> +   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further 
> information.");
>
> static void warn_unspecified_push_default_configuration(void)
> {
>
> --
> https://github.com/git/git/pull/201
> --
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
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>
Matthieu Moy· Feb 23, 2016, 21:03 UTC · re: Philip Oakley · lore

Re: [PATCH] push: shorten "push.default is unset" warning message

"Philip Oakley" <philipoakley@iee.org> writes:
> Shouldn't this also update the 'push' man page to state what the new
> default is. @gerry's comment to the top answer
> http://stackoverflow.com/a/13148313/717355 highlights that the word
> 'simple' is not even mentioned in the 'push' man page.

This is more or less a different topic IMHO. If git-push(1) is not clear enough, then it should be clarified regardless of this patch. But a patch follows.

-- 
Matthieu Moy
http://www-verimag.imag.fr/~moy/
Matthieu Moy· Feb 23, 2016, 21:04 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

[PATCH] Documentation/git-push: document that 'simple' is the default

The default behavior is well documented already in git-config(1), but git-push(1) itself did not mention it at all. For users willing to learn how "git push" works but not how to configure it, this makes the documentation cumbersome to read.

Make the git-push(1) page self-contained by adding a short summary of what 'push.default=simple' does, early in the page.

Signed-off-by: Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
---
 Documentation/git-push.txt | 7 +++++++
 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+)
Show changes to Documentation/git-push.txt +7 −0
diff --git a/Documentation/git-push.txt b/Documentation/git-push.txt
index 32482ce..a992793 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-push.txt
+++ b/Documentation/git-push.txt
@@ -37,6 +37,13 @@ the default `<refspec>` by consulting `remote.*.push` configuration,
 and if it is not found, honors `push.default` configuration to decide
 what to push (See linkgit:git-config[1] for the meaning of `push.default`).
 
+When neither the command-line nor the configuration specify what to
+push, the default behavior is used, which corresponds to the `simple`
+value for `push.default`: the current branch is pushed to the
+corresponding upstream branch, but as a safety measure, the push is
+aborted if the upstream branch does not have the same name as the
+local one.
+
 
 OPTIONS[[OPTIONS]]
 ------------------

-- 
2.7.2.334.g35ed2ae.dirty
Matthieu Moy· Feb 25, 2016, 09:21 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

[PATCH v2 0/2] Remove "push.default unset" warning

Junio and Peff both lean towards removing the message completely, and I think I'm convinced. We would have to do this in the future anyway.

While we're there, improve the manual for git push as suggested by Philip Oakley.

Matthieu Moy (2):
  push: remove "push.default is unset" warning message
  Documentation/git-push: document that 'simple' is the default
 Documentation/git-push.txt |  7 +++++++
 builtin/push.c             | 34 ----------------------------------
 2 files changed, 7 insertions(+), 34 deletions(-)
-- 
2.7.2.334.g35ed2ae.dirty
Matthieu Moy· Feb 25, 2016, 09:21 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

[PATCH v2 1/2] push: remove "push.default is unset" warning message

The warning was important before the 2.0 transition, and remained important for a while after, so that new users get push.default explicitly in their configuration and do not experience inconsistent behavior if they ever used an older version of Git.

The warning has been there since version 1.8.0 (Oct 2012), hence we can expect the vast majority of current Git users to have been exposed to it, and most of them have already set push.default explicitly. The switch from 'matching' to 'simple' was planned for 2.0 (May 2014), but actually happened only for 2.3 (Feb 2015).

Today, the warning is mostly seen by beginners, who have not set their push.default configuration (yet). For many of them, the warning is confusing because it talks about concepts that they have not learned and asks them a choice that they are not able to make yet. See for example

  http://stackoverflow.com/questions/13148066/warning-push-default-is-unset-its-implicit-value-is-changing-in-git-2-0
(1260 votes for the question, 1824 for the answer as of writing)

Remove the warning completely to avoid disturbing beginners. People who still occasionally use an older version of Git will be exposed to the warning through this old version.

Eventually, versions of Git without the warning will be deployed enough and tutorials will not need to advise setting push.default anymore.

Signed-off-by: Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
---
 builtin/push.c | 34 ----------------------------------
 1 file changed, 34 deletions(-)
Show changes to builtin/push.c +0 −34
diff --git a/builtin/push.c b/builtin/push.c
index 960ffc3..270db40 100644
--- a/builtin/push.c
+++ b/builtin/push.c
@@ -204,37 +204,6 @@ static void setup_push_current(struct remote *remote, struct branch *branch)
 	add_refspec(branch->name);
 }
 
-static char warn_unspecified_push_default_msg[] =
-N_("push.default is unset; its implicit value has changed in\n"
-   "Git 2.0 from 'matching' to 'simple'. To squelch this message\n"
-   "and maintain the traditional behavior, use:\n"
-   "\n"
-   "  git config --global push.default matching\n"
-   "\n"
-   "To squelch this message and adopt the new behavior now, use:\n"
-   "\n"
-   "  git config --global push.default simple\n"
-   "\n"
-   "When push.default is set to 'matching', git will push local branches\n"
-   "to the remote branches that already exist with the same name.\n"
-   "\n"
-   "Since Git 2.0, Git defaults to the more conservative 'simple'\n"
-   "behavior, which only pushes the current branch to the corresponding\n"
-   "remote branch that 'git pull' uses to update the current branch.\n"
-   "\n"
-   "See 'git help config' and search for 'push.default' for further information.\n"
-   "(the 'simple' mode was introduced in Git 1.7.11. Use the similar mode\n"
-   "'current' instead of 'simple' if you sometimes use older versions of Git)");
-
-static void warn_unspecified_push_default_configuration(void)
-{
-	static int warn_once;
-
-	if (warn_once++)
-		return;
-	warning("%s\n", _(warn_unspecified_push_default_msg));
-}
-
 static int is_workflow_triangular(struct remote *remote)
 {
 	struct remote *fetch_remote = remote_get(NULL);
@@ -253,9 +222,6 @@ static void setup_default_push_refspecs(struct remote *remote)
 		break;
 
 	case PUSH_DEFAULT_UNSPECIFIED:
-		warn_unspecified_push_default_configuration();
-		/* fallthru */
-
 	case PUSH_DEFAULT_SIMPLE:
 		if (triangular)
 			setup_push_current(remote, branch);

-- 
2.7.2.334.g35ed2ae.dirty
Matthieu Moy· Feb 25, 2016, 09:22 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

[PATCH v2 2/2] Documentation/git-push: document that 'simple' is the default

The default behavior is well documented already in git-config(1), but git-push(1) itself did not mention it at all. For users willing to learn how "git push" works but not how to configure it, this makes the documentation cumbersome to read.

Make the git-push(1) page self-contained by adding a short summary of what 'push.default=simple' does, early in the page.

Signed-off-by: Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@imag.fr>
---
 Documentation/git-push.txt | 7 +++++++
 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+)
Show changes to Documentation/git-push.txt +7 −0
diff --git a/Documentation/git-push.txt b/Documentation/git-push.txt
index 32482ce..a992793 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-push.txt
+++ b/Documentation/git-push.txt
@@ -37,6 +37,13 @@ the default `<refspec>` by consulting `remote.*.push` configuration,
 and if it is not found, honors `push.default` configuration to decide
 what to push (See linkgit:git-config[1] for the meaning of `push.default`).
 
+When neither the command-line nor the configuration specify what to
+push, the default behavior is used, which corresponds to the `simple`
+value for `push.default`: the current branch is pushed to the
+corresponding upstream branch, but as a safety measure, the push is
+aborted if the upstream branch does not have the same name as the
+local one.
+
 
 OPTIONS[[OPTIONS]]
 ------------------

-- 
2.7.2.334.g35ed2ae.dirty
Jeff King· Feb 26, 2016, 10:54 UTC · re: Matthieu Moy · lore

Re: [PATCH v2 0/2] Remove "push.default unset" warning

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 10:21:58AM +0100, Matthieu Moy wrote:
> Junio and Peff both lean towards removing the message completely, and
> I think I'm convinced. We would have to do this in the future anyway.
Unsurprisingly, this series looks good to me. :)
-Peff

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