Re: Should "git apply --check" imply verbose?

[Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>]

On Tue, 20 Aug 2013 12:45:03 -0700
Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> wrote:

> Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org> writes:
> 
> >> I do not think it is necessarily a good idea to assume that people
> >> who are learning "git apply" know how GNU patch works.
> >
> > Linus told me that "git apply" was basically a replacement for patch.
> > Why would you think it would not be a good idea to assume that people
> > would not be familiar with how GNU patch works?
> 
> The audience of Git these days are far more widely spread than the
> kernel circle.  I am not opposed to _helping_ those who happen to
> know "patch", but I was against a description that assumes readers
> know it, i.e. making it a requirement to know "patch" to understand
> "apply".

Patch is used by much more than just the kernel folks ;-)  I've been
using patch much longer than I've been doing kernel development.


> 
> >> But I do agree that the description of -v, --verbose has a lot of
> >> room for improvement.
> >> 
> >> 	Report progress to stderr. By default, only a message about the
> >> 	current patch being applied will be printed. This option will cause
> >> 	additional information to be reported.
> >> 
> >> It is totally unclear what "additional information" is reported at
> >> all.
> 
> In other words, your enhancement to the documentation could go like:
> 
> 	... By default, ... With this option, you will additionally
> 	see such and such and such in the output (this is similar to
> 	what "patch --dry-run" would give you).  See the EXAMPLES
> 	section to get a feel of how it looks like.
> 
> and I would not be opposed, as long as "such and such and such" are
> written in such a way that the reader does not have to have a prior
> experience with GNU patch in order to understand it.
> 
> Clear?

Looks good to me. Paul, what do you think?

Thanks,

-- Steve