From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Jonathan Nieder Subject: Re: Useless error message? Date: Thu, 22 Apr 2010 05:38:30 -0500 Message-ID: <20100422103830.GB701@progeny.tock> References: <20100421221953.GA25348@progeny.tock> <7vwrw0573t.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org> <20100422094153.GA504@progeny.tock> <4BD01E09.8080504@op5.se> <20100422101535.GB625@progeny.tock> <4BD0247A.4080103@op5.se> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Cc: Junio C Hamano , Aghiles , git list , Kim Ebert To: Andreas Ericsson X-From: git-owner@vger.kernel.org Thu Apr 22 12:38:37 2010 connect(): No such file or directory Return-path: Envelope-to: gcvg-git-2@lo.gmane.org Received: from vger.kernel.org ([209.132.180.67]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1O4tno-00022g-DC for gcvg-git-2@lo.gmane.org; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 12:38:36 +0200 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1753991Ab0DVKiT convert rfc822-to-quoted-printable (ORCPT ); Thu, 22 Apr 2010 06:38:19 -0400 Received: from mail-qy0-f179.google.com ([209.85.221.179]:50514 "EHLO mail-qy0-f179.google.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1753813Ab0DVKiS (ORCPT ); Thu, 22 Apr 2010 06:38:18 -0400 Received: by qyk9 with SMTP id 9so10983080qyk.1 for ; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 03:38:17 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:received:received:date:from:to:cc:subject :message-id:references:mime-version:content-type:content-disposition :content-transfer-encoding:in-reply-to:user-agent; bh=KXp1VANtXutmj/VA1W2uCEzyR/KheRI7KOIXmzASvSU=; b=Mmi5vlLLbs/HhC8n4LOtSz4mVG+iyR0th9TtZFmfFIo0POcNYU1JmyZcSIoJHvxNru daWbVg+/UmoLNQu99CJjGKhqzxEIDSyQ49XSMpuSmenAq8v1sdWBTCGBinCJZWp+TgMv tL5RivxINdKamUY07HdAvMeifyTQWRZfQ5FhY= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=date:from:to:cc:subject:message-id:references:mime-version :content-type:content-disposition:content-transfer-encoding :in-reply-to:user-agent; b=N8nNqv5F5BEYJ9/lEuBwPOLzjgvR2pIO/u3wLCwTDe6aaAAV/iMN5dd4RDDVMmCzqA XmbFcze4zg+FntoyUjIp3mrnsf4Opz4shjzjF9Gfrr06cKhhD+ACo+uqZg6sjNsFPAg4 h22caY+LCRD6XHR36q75yJb+6ggNY2koa7hCM= Received: by 10.224.78.104 with SMTP id j40mr3186387qak.251.1271932697125; Thu, 22 Apr 2010 03:38:17 -0700 (PDT) Received: from progeny.tock (c-98-212-3-231.hsd1.il.comcast.net [98.212.3.231]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id 21sm7260344iwn.3.2010.04.22.03.38.15 (version=SSLv3 cipher=RC4-MD5); Thu, 22 Apr 2010 03:38:16 -0700 (PDT) Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <4BD0247A.4080103@op5.se> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.20 (2009-06-14) Sender: git-owner@vger.kernel.org Precedence: bulk List-ID: X-Mailing-List: git@vger.kernel.org Archived-At: Andreas Ericsson wrote: > On 04/22/2010 12:15 PM, Jonathan Nieder wrote: >> (*) $ git clone git://git.example.com/~u/foo >> remote: Cannot read the specified repo [...] > So that would be the new error message for everything that fails, the= n? No. Of course, the opposite is the point. I just mean there should be an error message for all conditions that are lumped together with ENOENT to avoid information disclosure. I don=E2=80=99t care much how = the message is phrased. > If you have the wrong > repo address, you'd still have to check up with whoever gave it to > you to get it right. If it *does* crash, you'd still have to get > hold of the server admin to tell him that it has crashed. Many things can go wrong other than a missing repo. For example, there might be objects missing, or high load, or memory corruption. In the =E2=80=9Cwrong address=E2=80=9D case, I know who to go to to fix= it: ask the person who gave me the address. In the =E2=80=9Ccorrupt repository=E2=80=9D case, I should go to the re= pository owner. In the =E2=80=9Cserver hung up without any good reason=E2=80=9D case, I= should try to narrow down the problem, perhaps with the help of the server admin or my network administrator. Is it really so unusual to want to distinguish this from other cases? Without code this is all theoretical anyway. And that=E2=80=99s the re= al problem: to the uninitiated, it is not easy to write code to try this out because the side band is not set up in time. Sigh, Jonathan