Re: [PATCH] format-patch: Add --rfc for the common case of [RFC PATCH]

[Josh Triplett <josh@joshtriplett.org>]

On Fri, Sep 16, 2016 at 05:49:22PM -0700, Jeff King wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 16, 2016 at 10:27:45AM -0700, Josh Triplett wrote:
> 
> > By far, the most common subject-prefix I've seen other than "PATCH" is
> > "RFC PATCH" (or occasionally "PATCH RFC").  Seems worth optimizing for
> > the common case, to avoid having to spell it out the long way as
> > --subject-prefix='RFC PATCH'.
> 
> "RFC" is the most common one for me, too. And if it ends here, I'm OK
> with it. But I'm a little worried with ending up with a proliferation of
> options.

I haven't seen a significant number of variations on subject prefixes; I
can't think of any other prefix I've seen often enough to suggest an
option.

> If we had a short-option for --subject-prefix, then:
> 
>   -P RFC
> 
> is not so bad compared to "--rfc". But if you want to spell it as "RFC
> PATCH" that's getting a bit longer. We could have a short option for
> "tag this in the subject prefix _in addition_ to writing PATCH". And
> then you could do:
> 
>   -T RFC
> 
> I dunno. One other thing to consider is that format-patch takes
> arbitrary diff options, so we'd want to avoid stomping on them with any
> short options (which is why I used "-T" instead of "-t", though I find
> it unlikely that many people use the latter with format-patch). That's a
> point in favor of --rfc, I think.

I agree; the short option space seems more contentious.  And in any
case, I find --rfc more ergonomic than "-T RFC". :)

> >  builtin/log.c           | 10 ++++++++++
> >  t/t4014-format-patch.sh |  9 +++++++++
> >  2 files changed, 19 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
> 
> Documentation?

Oops, thanks.  I'll send v2 shortly.

> > +static int rfc_callback(const struct option *opt, const char *arg, int unset)
> > +{
> > +	subject_prefix = 1;
> > +	((struct rev_info *)opt->value)->subject_prefix = xstrdup("RFC PATCH");
> > +	return 0;
> > +}
> 
> I was going to complain that you don't free() the previous value, but
> actually the other callers do not xstrdup() in the first place (and we
> do not need to do so here, either, as it's a string literal). We
> actually _do_ allocate a new copy when reading the value from config,
> but it's probably not a big deal in practice to leak that.
> 
> I also wonder if you could implement this as just:
> 
>   return subject_prefix_callback(opt, "RFC PATCH", unset);
> 
> And then if you write the documentation as:
> 
>   --rfc::
> 	Behave as if --subject-prefix="RFC PATCH" was specified.
> 
> then it will be trivially correct. :)

Nice idea; will do.

> > +cat >expect <<'EOF'
> > +Subject: [RFC PATCH 1/1] header with . in it
> > +EOF
> > +test_expect_success '--rfc' '
> > +	git format-patch -n -1 --stdout --rfc >patch &&
> > +	grep ^Subject: patch >actual &&
> > +	test_cmp expect actual
> > +'
> 
> Our usual style these days is to set up expectations inside the test
> blocks (and use "<<-" to get nice indentation; we also typically use
> "\EOF" but that's purely style).

I copied this from a test immediately above it. :)

I can change it easily enough, though.

- Josh Triplett