threads / discuss / 60040

Draft of Git Rev News edition 101

Subject: Draft of Git Rev News edition 101

## tl;dr

4 messages between Jul 29, 2023 and Jul 31, 2023.

replies: 3people: 3as markdown or json

Christian Couder· Jul 29, 2023, 20:37 UTC · lore

Hi everyone!

A draft of a new Git Rev News edition is available here:

  https://github.com/git/git.github.io/blob/master/rev_news/drafts/edition-101.md

Everyone is welcome to contribute in any section either by editing the above page on GitHub and sending a pull request, or by commenting on this GitHub issue:

  https://github.com/git/git.github.io/issues/652

You can also reply to this email.

In general all kinds of contributions, for example proofreading, suggestions for articles or links, help on the issues in GitHub, volunteering for being interviewed and so on, are very much appreciated.

I tried to Cc everyone who appears in this edition, but maybe I missed some people, sorry about that.

Jakub, Markus, Kaartic and I plan to publish this edition late on Monday July 31th.

Thanks, Christian.

Kristoffer Haugsbakk· Jul 31, 2023, 10:10 UTC · re: Christian Couder · lore

Re: Draft of Git Rev News edition 101

> The Magic of Empty Git Commit by Pradumna Saraf on DEV.to - a simple
> description on how to create an empty commit, and why one would might
> want one.

The article does a poor job of motivating empty commits in my opinion.

Show 7 quoted lines

> > Although seemingly counterintuitive, [empty commits] offer valuable
> benefits for documentation, triggering automation.
> […]
> Empty commits might seem unusual, but they offer significant advantages
> in managing version control. By documenting milestones, triggering
> automation processes, and maintaining codebase stability, empty commits
> can improve collaboration and project management.

So one use-case that is clear from the above is as a hack for triggering builds or something that require a new commit (in other words: that can’t simply be rerun). The rest—documenting milestones, maintaining codebase stability—is not obvious since you usually do that in a regular commit.

You can see from the comments that other people also don’t understand what the motivation is.

I use empty commits myself because I’ve seen use-cases for it described on this list. For example: storing the cover letter as the first (empty) commit on the branch. Definitely useful for in-progress work.

The article, in contrast, just asserts that it is useful and then provides a one-liner as its technical content.

My opinion from the peanut gallery is that the article isn’t worth the inclusion.

-- 
Kristoffer Haugsbakk

Christian Couder· Jul 31, 2023, 17:14 UTC · re: Kristoffer Haugsbakk · lore

Re: Draft of Git Rev News edition 101

On Mon, Jul 31, 2023 at 12:11 PM Kristoffer Haugsbakk <code@khaugsbakk.name> wrote:

Show 6 quoted lines

>
> > The Magic of Empty Git Commit by Pradumna Saraf on DEV.to - a simple
> > description on how to create an empty commit, and why one would might
> > want one.
>
> The article does a poor job of motivating empty commits in my opinion.

...

> My opinion from the peanut gallery is that the article isn’t worth the
> inclusion.

Thanks for your opinion!

Jakub what do you think about it?

Junio C Hamano· Jul 31, 2023, 17:51 UTC · re: Christian Couder · lore

Re: Draft of Git Rev News edition 101

The particular article may offer little new things, but I suspect other articles in the same list are also rehashes of what has already been covered elsewhere, so it does not look particularly bad from that point of view. I have nothing against its inclusion or removal from the list, but I hope the author of the article does not take offence (this is the risk of working on drafts in the public).

On Mon, Jul 31, 2023 at 10:14 AM Christian Couder <christian.couder@gmail.com> wrote:

Show 18 quoted lines

>
> On Mon, Jul 31, 2023 at 12:11 PM Kristoffer Haugsbakk
> <code@khaugsbakk.name> wrote:
> >
> > > The Magic of Empty Git Commit by Pradumna Saraf on DEV.to - a simple
> > > description on how to create an empty commit, and why one would might
> > > want one.
> >
> > The article does a poor job of motivating empty commits in my opinion.
>
> ...
>
> > My opinion from the peanut gallery is that the article isn’t worth the
> > inclusion.
>
> Thanks for your opinion!
>
> Jakub what do you think about it?