Hi Junio, > It would conceptually be a lot cleaner to treat updating of remote > Ibranch description as a separate "repository management" class of > Ioperation, similar to setting the repository description stored in > I$GIT_DIR/description.
I agree, it should be a distinct operation. I was thinking that when you have a remote bare repository, the normal way of adding contents to it is to push to it, and thus also adding a description should be done with some sort of pushing. Creating branches is also normally done with a push (think how difficult it is to create a branch in a bare repository when the HEAD is not set ...). -Angelo On 14 November 2012 14:57, Junio C Hamano <gits...@pobox.com> wrote: > Angelo Borsotti <angelo.borso...@gmail.com> writes: > >> currently, there is no means to push a branch description to a remote >> repository. It is possible to create a branch, but not to set its >> description. > > Correct. You have to go to the remote repository and run "git > branch --edit-description" there; there is currently no way to do > this remotely, which may be an issue, but... > >> Would not be more correct to push also branch descriptions when >> branches are pushed? > > ... I do not think "git push" is the best place to do so, given the > inherently local nature of branches and branch descriptions. > > Imagine the project creates a branch "magic" to enhance its system > with magic words. The description for the "magic" branch in the > project may say "support magic words" or something. > > You and your friend are tasked to add a handful of magic words, > e.g. "xyzzy", "frotz" and "nitfol". You may start your work like so > on your "magic-xyzzy" branch: > > $ git clone git://example.com/zork.git/ > $ git checkout -b magic-xyzzy -t origin/magic > > And you say something like "add xyzzy magic" in its branch > description. > > $ git branch --edit-description magic-xyzzy > > After finishing your work, you may push it > > $ git push origin magic-xyzzy:magic > > Should the description of the subtask "add xyzzy magic" overwrite > the purpose of the project wide "magic" branch "support magic words"? > Most likely not. > > The local nature of the description becomes even more clear if you > imagine the case where the push at the last stage gets rejected due > to non-fast-forward error (in other words, your friend has already > pushed her support of the "frotz" magic to the "magic" branch. > > In fact, you would normally not directly push your magic-xyzzy > branch to the magic branch, but you would do something like this > once you are done: > > $ git checkout -b magic -t origin/magic > $ git pull origin ;# to update with her work > $ git merge magic-xyzzy > $ git push origin magic > > And the last "merge" is where the description for your magic-xyzzy > is used to fill the commit log template for you to explain your > merge (that is, you are merging a branch whose description is "add > xyzzy magic"). There is no reason to propagate the description of > your magic-xyzzy topic to the description of shared magic branch > when you push, as this merge commit already records what the branch > that was merged was about. > > So you could modify "git push" to set the branch description when > you push to create a branch remotely, but in general, "git push" > should not be updating the branch description with the description > of your local branch. This comes as a consequence of the fact that > the purpose of the branch in the remote central repository is, more > often than not, different from the purpose of the corresponding > branch in your repository. > > It would conceptually be a lot cleaner to treat updating of remote > branch description as a separate "repository management" class of > operation, similar to setting the repository description stored in > $GIT_DIR/description. -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in the body of a message to majord...@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
