[Q] would it be bad to make /etc/gitconfig runtime configurable?

The subject says it all. Would it be bad if we introduce an environment variable, GIT_SYSTEM_CONFIG=/etc/gitconfig, that names an alternative location of the system-wide configuration file?

That would supersede/deprecate GIT_CONFIG_NOSYSTEM that we introduced primarily so that we can run our tests without getting affected by the configuration that happens to be effective on the host that the test is being run.

On Tue, Sep 27, 2016 at 10:05:37AM -0700, Junio C Hamano wrote:

I can't think of a reason it would be bad. There shouldn't be a security question, as controlling the environment already lets you run arbitrary code, override system config variables, etc.

I know when I was writing the tests for 0d44a2d (config: return configset value for current_config_ functions, 2016-05-26) I had to omit the "system" case, because we had no way of pointing at a specific file. So I do not know whether a runtime system config variable would be useful for users, but it would definitely make testing easier.

-Peff

Hi,

On Tue, 27 Sep 2016, Jeff King wrote:

I cannot think of any reason right now, either, but my gut tells me that this needs to simmer a while in the backs of our minds, to give potential reasons a chance to come forward.

What would be the use case, BTW? IOW what would it solve that cannot already be solved by using XDG_CONFIG_HOME?

Ciao, Dscho

On Mon, Oct 03, 2016 at 01:06:10PM +0200, Johannes Schindelin wrote:

The patches Junio posted later use it for the test suite (and I also have had to skip some tests in the past related to system config because of its lack).

I would also use it when doing git experiments on GitHub servers. We keep several relevant config settings in /etc/gitconfig, so if I were to say, build a new version of git and test how it repacked torvalds/linux, I need to make sure it picks up the same config. Usually I do it by baking in the right /etc/gitconfig at build time, but it would be less annoying to be able to override it at run-time.

I admit both of those are uses for git _developers_, though, not git _users_.

-Peff

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

Yes, this is meant for developers and not users.

The initial question probably should have stated more explicitly, e.g. "I am wondering if it would be helpful to developers if we add this thing; does anybody think of a reason why exposing it to end users is a bad idea?"