Re: [PATCH] messages: avoid SHA-1 in end-user facing messages

[Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>]

Derrick Stolee <stolee@gmail.com> writes:

>> N_("Show blank SHA-1 for boundary commits (Default: off)")),
>> N_("Blank object names of boundary commits (Default: off)")),
>
> Is there a reason you dropped "show" here? Perhaps your
> intention is to use "blank" as a verb, but it read a bit
> awkwardly to me.

You guessed my intention correctly.  By using the word "blank" as a
verb (i.e. to fill the space, which should ordinarily contain
something meaningful, with whitespace instead), I can shorten "Show
blank" to compensate the lengthening of the message caused by
replacing "SHA-1" with "object name".

It also is more correct.  There is no "blank SHA-1"; blank cannot be
a valid SHA-1 hash value.  We are showing blank instead of SHA-1,
and I found that "blank" as a verb exactly has that meaning, which
was convenient.

The above is *NOT* to defend the choice of the exact phasing I used,
but to explain the criteria we need to use to come up with a better
alternative (in other words, why "show blank object name for..." is
a better replacement).

A better phrasing to replace it is of course welcome.

Thanks.