Re: [PATCH 3/4] add -p: optionally prompt for single characters

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

Thomas Rast <trast@student.ethz.ch> writes:

> Jeff King wrote:
>> On Mon, Feb 02, 2009 at 10:46:30PM +0100, Thomas Rast wrote:
>> Minor nit: the name of this variable implies that it will be used across
>> all interactive commands (including any future ones). But the
>> description is intimately linked with perl. Maybe structure it like
>> "here is what this does in general, but here are some specific caveats".
>> Something like:
>> 
>>   interactive.readkey::
>>         In interactive programs, allow the user to provide one-letter
>>         input with a single key (i.e., without hitting enter). Currently
>>         this is used only by the `\--patch` mode of linkgit:git-add[1].
>>         Note that this feature is silently disabled for Perl programs
>>         (like git-add) if Term::ReadKey is not available.
>
> Junio indicates in the corresponding pu topic that he is of the same
> opinion, so I'll reroll with your help text.  (It's somewhat
> inaccurate since git-add is not really a perl program, but let's not
> tell the users about our implementation details.)

We could be even more vague and say "is silently disabled if the
underlying system software does not let it read just a single keystroke in
a portable way", or something like that.

And readkey would be a bad name.  You are doing singlekey, and use of
readkey *is* an implementation detail, no?