On Wed, Oct 10, 2018 at 05:59:05AM +0900, Junio C Hamano wrote:
> I do not offhand know if we want "show the current one only" option
> that is "command mode" sitting next to "list", "delete", "rename"
> etc., or "limit the operation to the one that is currently cheked
> out".  If we want the former, the name of the option must *NOT* be
> just "current".  Have a verb in its name to avoid it from getting
> mistaken as a botched attempt to do the latter.  Somethng like
> "--show-current", "--list-current", "--display-current", etc.

I had considered sending a patch with this option spelled "--show".
This is certainly a highly desired feature (hence my intent to send a
patch), and I think there's room for both a porcelain (this series) and
a plumbing (git rev-parse --abbrev-ref) version.

> Even if we were doing the latter (i.e. focused "this is only for
> listing/showing"), if we do not want to close the door to later
> extend the concept of "current" to the former (i.e. "--show-current"
> becomes a convenience synonym for "--list --current-only") we also
> need to think about what to do with the detached HEAD state.  When
> the concept of "current" is extended to become "usually an operation
> can work on multiple branches but we are limiting it to the current
> one", detached HEAD state is conceptually "not having any current
> branch".  We could fail the operation (i.e. you told me to distim
> the branch but there is no such branch) or make it a silent no-op
> (i.e. you told me to distim no branch, so nothing happened and there
> is no error).

What I would suggest is the same thing git status shows: "HEAD (detached
at...)".  I'll admit it isn't strictly a branch, but that's what most
people will want to see, I expect.
-- 
brian m. carlson: Houston, Texas, US
OpenPGP: https://keybase.io/bk2204