Re: git status --porcelain is a mess that needs fixing

[Julian Phillips <julian@quantumfyre.co.uk>]

On Sat, 10 Apr 2010 00:09:59 -0400, Jeff King <peff@peff.net> wrote:
> Your parser is already broken if you are calling split, as the filenames
> may contain spaces (and will be quoted in that case, and you need to
> unmangle). You should use "-z".
> 
> You will probably then realize that the "-z" format looks like:
> 
>   XY file1\0file2\0
> 
> which still sucks. It would be more friendly as:
> 
>   XY\0file1\0file2\0
> 
> So you could split on "\0". But even with that, you can't just blindly
> split, as the column and record separators are the same, and you might
> have one or two filenames.

Not true.  If the second form was used, then you _can_ split on \0.  It
will tokenise the data for you, and then you consume ether two or three
tokens depending on the status flags.  So it would make the parsing
simpler.  But to make it even easier, how about adding a -Z that makes the
output format "XY\0file1\0[file2]\0" (i.e. always three tokens per record,
with the third token being empty if there is no second filename)?  Though
if future expandability was wanted you could end each record with \0\0 and
then parsing would be a two stages of split on \0\0 for records and then
split on \0 for entries?  The is already precedence for the -z option to
change the output format, so a second similar switch should be ok?  Then
the updated documentation could recommend --porcelain -Z for new users
without affecting old ones.

-- 
Julian