Re: [PATCH 2/2] wt-status: take advice.statusHints seriously

[Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com>]

Michael J Gruber <git@drmicha.warpmail.net> writes:
> Tay Ray Chuan venit, vidit, dixit 23.04.2010 06:15:
>> 
>> On Fri, Apr 23, 2010 at 4:30 AM, Michael J Gruber
>> <git@drmicha.warpmail.net> wrote:
>>>                else if (s->untracked.nr)
>>> -                       printf("nothing added to commit but untracked files present (use \"git add\" to track)\n");
>>> +                       printf("nothing added to commit but untracked files present%s\n",
>>> +                               advice_status_hints
>>> +                               ? " (use \"git add\" to track)" : "");
>> 
>> while we're at it, perhaps we could put the hints on its own line,
> 
> I don't think I'm the only one to turn sour at every encounter with the
> phrase "while we're at it". I did fix one extraneous space in code
> "while I was at it", yes, but:

I agre that it might be a good idea, but it is not something to do
"while we're at it".
 
Tay Ray Chuan probably meant that he "while at it" (while reviewing
this patch) had this idea...

>> with a "hint: " prefix:
>> 
>>   nothing added to commit but untracked files present
>>   hint: use "git add" to track
>> 
>> This way, we give future git usability hackers the space to elaborate
>> further on why a certain flag or command was recommended.
>> 
> 
> I'm suggesting a change in (output) behaviour (hint vs. no hint), which
> one may even consider to be a bug fix in terms of matching the obvious
> expections related to advice.statusHints false.
> 
> You're suggesting a different presentation of the output. In fact, I
> noticed inconsistent capitalisation in the hints which should be
> adjusted, maybe together with the presentation.
> 
> But I deem both changes (overlapping though) unrelated.

Perhaps git should introduce helper commands, similar to 'die', 'warn'
and 'error', but for hints and advices, e.g. hint(bool, "<string>")
which would print advice on its own line (like 'die' and 'warn') with
appropriate prefix if advices, and e.g. 'advice', which would return
either empty string or string with advice (a bit like 'error').

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland
ShadeHawk on #git