Re: [POC PATCH] diff options: Introduce --interactive

[Ping Yin <pkufranky@gmail.com>]

On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 5:04 PM, David Aguilar <davvid@gmail.com> wrote:
> On  0, Ping Yin <pkufranky@gmail.com> wrote:
>> The new option --interactive introduces an interactive diff mode. Now we
>> can choose to see the diff for a selected file.
>
> I just tried it out.  Very cool.
> It's exactly the functionality users have asked me about.
>
> I just sent a for-the-future patch that teaches difftool
> to tell difftool-helper that it shouldn't prompt when
> you're using --interactive.
>
> I noticed git-diff doesn't have a -i flag yet,
> perhaps it could be the shorthand for --interactive?
>
> (I'd have to change that for-the-future patch I just sent
>  too since it also only checks for the long form...)
>
> I like it.
>
>>
>> This is a preparation to introduce the --tool option to launch the
>> external diff tool for a selected file.
>
> With both of our latest patches:
>
>        git difftool --interactive <revargs>
>
> does exactly what one would expect it to.
>
>
> How are you envisioning --tool?  It'd be great if we didn't
> need the perl wrapper, though something does need to set
> GIT_EXTERNAL_DIFF/GIT_PAGER/etc... (that is, unless you have a
> better way =))

These environment vars can be set in diff.c directly, by passing the
git-difftool. So i think the difftool wrapper can be just removed once
the --tool option is available

>
>
>> >> When the user types a number,  git-difftool-helper is launched to show
>> >> the diff for the corresponding file.
>> >
>> > Cool.
>> > I had two patches that I sent to the list for
>> > git-difftool.perl.  If you're going to patch it then you might
>> > want to base it on top of those.
>> >
>> When i try to code on git-difftool.perl, i find it is more appropriate to add
>> the --interactive and then --tool options to git-diff itself. So here is a
>> proof of concept patch based on next. What we should do next is to try to
>> design a good UI.
>
> I'll see if I can come up with any suggestions.
> I liked it on the first test drive.
>

Here is the UI i am envisioning, although i am not a good ui designer

1. interactive diff

$ git diff --interactive
1: M -10/+20   a.c
2: R -5 /+0    a1.c => a2.c
3: C -5 /+0    b1.c => b2.c

[p] What now [<n>,t<n>?,p<n>,t,p,q,?]?

When hitting '?'
<n>  - see diff of file <n> in default mode
p<n> - see diff of file <n> in patch mode
t<n> - see diff of file <n> in tool mode
p    - change to patch diff mode
t    - change to tool diff mode
q    - quit this ineraction
?    - print help

When hitting 't'
[t] What now [<n>,t<n>?,p<n>,t,p,q,?]?

2. interactive diff with --tool
if using "git diff --interactive --tool", then the default diff mode is tool

$ git diff --interactive --tool
1: M -10/+20   a.c
2: R -5 /+0    a1.c => a2.c
3: C -5 /+0    b1.c => b2.c

[t] What now [<n>,t<n>?,p<n>,t,p,q,?]?

3. other considerations
 - --tool can imply --interactive
 - --interactive can imply -p
 - pager is disabled in interactive mode