Re: [PATCH 0/2] Slightly simplify partial clone user experience

[Derrick Stolee <stolee@gmail.com>]

On 3/22/2020 6:58 AM, Christian Couder wrote:
> On Sun, Mar 22, 2020 at 10:51 AM Jeff King <peff@peff.net> wrote:
>>
>> On Thu, Mar 19, 2020 at 05:28:05PM +0000, Derrick Stolee via GitGitGadget wrote:
>>
>>> This was something discussed briefly at the contributor summit: users will
>>> have a hard time remembering git clone --filter=blob:none <url>. This series
>>> simply adds a --partial option that is equivalent to --filter=blob:none,
>>> with the ability to specify a size using --partial=<size> that is equivalent
>>> to --filter=blob:limit=<size>.
>>
>> I have mixed feelings on this. I do like making things less arcane for
>> users. But are we locking in a behavior for --partial that we might not
>> want to live with forever? I.e., the current thinking for partial clones
>> is to fetch no blobs at all, get all commits and trees, apply sparse
>> filters, and then fault in the blobs we need. But imagine we later grow
>> the ability to easily avoid fetching all of the trees. Would we regret
>> having the simple name "--partial" taken?
> 
> I agree with that. Something like "--filter-blobs" for
> "--filter=blob:none" and perhaps "--filter-blobs=<size>" for
> "--filter=blob:limit=<size>" might be worth it though.

Thanks for the perspective on this. The --filter-blobs[=<size>] should
be less likely to collide with an alternative definition of "partial".

While we are thinking in this space, what if we had a "partial-clone"
builtin? It could be a light wrapper around "git clone" where

  git partial-clone [--limit=<size>] [options] <url> [<dir>]

would do the same thing as

  git clone --filter=blob:[none|limit=<size>] [options] <url> [<dir>]

Just spit-balling here.

In the meantime, I'll work to adjust my patches to only be the
documentation of the --filter option.

Thanks,
-Stolee