Re: [PATCH] push: improve consistency of output when "up to date"

[Eric Sunshine <sunshine@sunshineco.com>]

On Thu, Jan 11, 2024 at 5:33 PM Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> wrote:
> Eric Sunshine <sunshine@sunshineco.com> writes:
> > Thanks. This particular change is proposed periodically...
> > ... but has not been considered desirable.
> >
> > See, for instance, this email thread explaining the rationale for
> > avoiding such a change:
> > https://lore.kernel.org/git/pull.1298.git.1658908927714.gitgitgadget@gmail.com/T/
>
> Let's do the second best thing, leave a short comment near them, to
> make it possible for those who are motivated enough to find out why
> we decided to tell them "do not modify".
> ---
> diff --git a/builtin/send-pack.c b/builtin/send-pack.c
> @@ -333,6 +333,7 @@ int cmd_send_pack(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
>         if (!ret && !transport_refs_pushed(remote_refs))
> +               /* do not modify this string */
>                 fprintf(stderr, "Everything up-to-date\n");

Yes, that helps, though, we can probably be a bit more friendly to
future developers. Rather than insisting that they dig through
history, we could use a slightly less terse comment, such as:

    /* stable plumbing output; do not modify or localize */