Re: [PATCH v2] rev-list docs: clarify --topo-order description

[Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu>]

On 08/16/2012 10:51 AM, Thomas Rast wrote:
> [...]
> is misleading.  I suppose the real problem is that the "true" ordering
> is completely obvious as the one ordering that does not require
> preprocessing, but ugly to specify in words.  Perhaps we can bikeshed a
> little?  How about
>
>    By default, commits are shown in an order that coincides with
>    `--date-order` on well-behaved history, but is faster to compute.

Maybe the problem is not the description of the options, but the options 
themselves.  Why does the behavior default to some mysterious order that 
we don't even want to document?  Only for the sake of computational 
efficiency.  This is the tail wagging the dog.

Why not turn the behavior on its head:

* Change the default behavior to be something well-defined, easy to 
document, and convenient for humans, such as "topological order with 
ties broken by timestamp" or "approximate timestamp order, but 
respecting dependencies".

* Add a new option, --arbitrary-order, that explicitly chooses 
efficiency instead of a defined order.

That way the easiest thing to type is also the most convenient, whereas 
when you care about efficiency and *don't* care about order (i.e., 
mainly in scripts) you can explicitly request the high-performance option.

Michael

-- 
Michael Haggerty
mhagger@alum.mit.edu
http://softwareswirl.blogspot.com/