Re: [FAQ?] Rationale for git's way to manage the index

[Carl Worth <cworth@cworth.org>]

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On Wed, 9 May 2007 08:52:09 -0700 (PDT), Linus Torvalds wrote:
[Snip good description of rebuilding a branch to meet some "target"
state.]

That's all really good stuff. And as you mentioned you sometimes use
cherry-pick during this rebuilding, one can also use "git add -i" to
help with splitting up an ugly commit that should have been multiple
commit.

For example, a sequence might look like this, (I always use "desired"
where you use target):

	git diff HEAD desired | git apply
	git add -i
	git commit
	git reset --hard
	# test here and commit --amend as needed

And repeat that as needed. It's really no different than your "edit
the diff" approach. It's just using "add -i" instead of a text
editor. But I do admit that the commit;reset;test;--amend sequence
might seem a bit too awkward to some people.

> test-things, but since one of them was a filesystem fix, and the other one
> was in the kernel, rather than give all the paths explicitly, I'd do
>
> 	git commit fs/
>
> and it will automatically do the right thing (actually, I often end up
> using the two-stage "git add" + "git commit" thing, because one of the
> more common cases for me is that I'm going to commit a merge that I fixed
> up a conflict in, and then you have to do it that way).

This reminds me of a confusing semantic issue that came about with the
"new" add. It can be quite natural to commit a single file in one step
with:

	git commit some-file.c

or to do that in two steps with:

	git add some-file.c
	git commit

(which is particularly useful if one wants to add multiple files).

I recently found myself wanting to do a similar thing with a directory
path. I can commit a path with:

	git commit path/

but I don't get anything at all like the same semantics if I do:

	git add path/
	git commit

(since "git add" will recursively add all untracked files under path/).

Now the "recursively add all files" behavior is older, and has been an
essential part of git-add forever. But I found it to be not at all
what I wanted in this case, (where I'm now trained to say "git add" to
stage things into the index).

I don't know of any good fix for the problem now. Maybe I'll just need to
remember to break out that old "git update-index" for a situation like
this, but that sure feels clunky.

-Carl

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