[PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Denton Liu]

The documentation used to consider

	git diff <commit> <commit>

and

	git diff <commit>..<commit>

to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
<commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
was confusing for some users (including me!).

Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.

Document the preference of the first form so that future confusion can
be minimised.

Signed-off-by: Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com>
---

Thanks all on your feedback on the discussion thread[1]! I opted for
just the documentation-only route so we don't break any valid use-cases.

[1]: https://public-inbox.org/git/20190311093751.GA31092@archbookpro.localdomain/

 Documentation/git-diff.txt | 6 +++++-
 1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
+++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
@@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
 
 'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
 
-	This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
+	This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
+	users should prefer the previous form over this form
+	as this form may be more confusing due to the same
+	notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
+	linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
 	one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
 	using HEAD instead.
 
-- 
2.21.0.512.g57bf1b23e1

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Duy Nguyen]

On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 6:09 PM Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The documentation used to consider
>
>         git diff <commit> <commit>
>
> and
>
>         git diff <commit>..<commit>
>
> to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
> <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
> was confusing for some users (including me!).
>
> Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
> would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
> are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.
>
> Document the preference of the first form so that future confusion can
> be minimised.
>
> Signed-off-by: Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com>
> ---
>
> Thanks all on your feedback on the discussion thread[1]! I opted for
> just the documentation-only route so we don't break any valid use-cases.
>
> [1]: https://public-inbox.org/git/20190311093751.GA31092@archbookpro.localdomain/
>
>  Documentation/git-diff.txt | 6 +++++-
>  1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>
> diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
> --- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> +++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> @@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
>
>  'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
>
> -       This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
> +       This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
> +       users should prefer the previous form over this form
> +       as this form may be more confusing due to the same
> +       notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
> +       linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
>         one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
>         using HEAD instead.

This is fine as-is. But another option to reduce even more exposure of
these forms (both <commit>..[<commit>] and <commit>...[<commit>]) is
to delete these forms in "DESCRIPTION" section and add maybe "EXOTIC
SYNTAX" (or something) section after "OPTIONS" for just them.

> --
> 2.21.0.512.g57bf1b23e1
>


-- 
Duy

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Junio C Hamano]

Duy Nguyen <pclouds@gmail.com> writes:

>> -       This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
>> +       This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
>> +       users should prefer the previous form over this form
>> +       as this form may be more confusing due to the same
>> +       notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
>> +       linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
>>         one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
>>         using HEAD instead.
>
> This is fine as-is. But another option to reduce even more exposure of
> these forms (both <commit>..[<commit>] and <commit>...[<commit>]) is
> to delete these forms in "DESCRIPTION" section and add maybe "EXOTIC
> SYNTAX" (or something) section after "OPTIONS" for just them.

There is no other way to express A...B (well, short of spelling it
out as "$(git merge-base A B) B"), so while it makes quite a lot of
sense to discourage A..B (simply because .. is unnecessary and can
be replace with a string with one fewer letter in it, namely " "),
I am not sure if it is wise to throw the three-dot form into the
same basket.

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Denton Liu]

On Mon, Mar 18, 2019 at 03:45:25PM +0900, Junio C Hamano wrote:
> Duy Nguyen <pclouds@gmail.com> writes:
> 
> >> -       This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
> >> +       This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
> >> +       users should prefer the previous form over this form
> >> +       as this form may be more confusing due to the same
> >> +       notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
> >> +       linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
> >>         one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
> >>         using HEAD instead.
> >
> > This is fine as-is. But another option to reduce even more exposure of
> > these forms (both <commit>..[<commit>] and <commit>...[<commit>]) is
> > to delete these forms in "DESCRIPTION" section and add maybe "EXOTIC
> > SYNTAX" (or something) section after "OPTIONS" for just them.
> 
> There is no other way to express A...B (well, short of spelling it
> out as "$(git merge-base A B) B"), so while it makes quite a lot of
> sense to discourage A..B (simply because .. is unnecessary and can
> be replace with a string with one fewer letter in it, namely " "),
> I am not sure if it is wise to throw the three-dot form into the
> same basket.
> 

Perhaps we could add an option to use the base as a comparison,
something like "git diff --compare-base A B" which would mean 
"git diff $(git merge-base A B) B".

If we do this, we could keep feature-parity while deprecating the
confusing "range-notation" for diff. Then, we could possibly move .. and
... into a "RANGE-BASED SYNTAX" section and call it a day.

I now personally don't think that deprecating it in the code (or even
adding a warning) would be worth the effort since the syntax is so
ingrained in common usage. However, I believe that we should encourage
new users to avoid the range-syntax if possible.

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Johannes Schindelin]

Hi Junio,

On Mon, 18 Mar 2019, Junio C Hamano wrote:

> Duy Nguyen <pclouds@gmail.com> writes:
>
> >> -       This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
> >> +       This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
> >> +       users should prefer the previous form over this form
> >> +       as this form may be more confusing due to the same
> >> +       notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
> >> +       linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
> >>         one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
> >>         using HEAD instead.
> >
> > This is fine as-is. But another option to reduce even more exposure of
> > these forms (both <commit>..[<commit>] and <commit>...[<commit>]) is
> > to delete these forms in "DESCRIPTION" section and add maybe "EXOTIC
> > SYNTAX" (or something) section after "OPTIONS" for just them.
>
> There is no other way to express A...B (well, short of spelling it
> out as "$(git merge-base A B) B"), so while it makes quite a lot of
> sense to discourage A..B (simply because .. is unnecessary and can
> be replace with a string with one fewer letter in it, namely " "),
> I am not sure if it is wise to throw the three-dot form into the
> same basket.

I just happened to come upon a use case where the `A..B` way is not
actually useless: just after fetching a branch, I got the usual update
lines, and it is pretty convenient to be able to use them not only for
`git log`, but also for `git diff` invocations, to see what actually
changed (from two angles).

So maybe you could register this as a vote to not totally strike the A..B
notation from the manual.

Ciao,
Dscho

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason]

On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Denton Liu wrote:

> The documentation used to consider
>
> 	git diff <commit> <commit>
>
> and
>
> 	git diff <commit>..<commit>
>
> to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
> <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
> was confusing for some users (including me!).
>
> Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
> would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
> are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.
>
> Document the preference of the first form so that future confusion can
> be minimised.
>
> Signed-off-by: Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com>
> ---
>
> Thanks all on your feedback on the discussion thread[1]! I opted for
> just the documentation-only route so we don't break any valid use-cases.
>
> [1]: https://public-inbox.org/git/20190311093751.GA31092@archbookpro.localdomain/
>
>  Documentation/git-diff.txt | 6 +++++-
>  1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>
> diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
> --- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> +++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> @@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
>
>  'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
>
> -	This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
> +	This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
> +	users should prefer the previous form over this form
> +	as this form may be more confusing due to the same
> +	notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
> +	linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
>  	one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
>  	using HEAD instead.

I think we're better off just consistently recommending "A..B" instead
of "A B" and "fixing" any occurrence of the latter to the
former. I.e. not taking this patch & going in the other direction.

As noted in the thread you linked we'll always need ".." when one side
is "HEAD" implicitly, and that's a really common case.

So as confusing as the whole ".." v.s. "..." is in diff v.s. log I think
we're worse off with "A B", since we'll *still* need to document the
likes of "A.." and how that differs from log "A.." or "A...".

So sometimes using the whitespace form for two revs and then the ".."
when we just have one side makes things more confusing, not less. The
reader will be left having to juggle more complexity in their head, not
less.

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Duy Nguyen]

On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 8:41 PM Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
<avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Denton Liu wrote:
>
> > The documentation used to consider
> >
> >       git diff <commit> <commit>
> >
> > and
> >
> >       git diff <commit>..<commit>
> >
> > to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
> > <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
> > was confusing for some users (including me!).
> >
> > Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
> > would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
> > are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.
> >
> > Document the preference of the first form so that future confusion can
> > be minimised.
> >
> > Signed-off-by: Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com>
> > ---
> >
> > Thanks all on your feedback on the discussion thread[1]! I opted for
> > just the documentation-only route so we don't break any valid use-cases.
> >
> > [1]: https://public-inbox.org/git/20190311093751.GA31092@archbookpro.localdomain/
> >
> >  Documentation/git-diff.txt | 6 +++++-
> >  1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
> >
> > diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> > index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
> > --- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> > +++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> > @@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
> >
> >  'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
> >
> > -     This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
> > +     This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
> > +     users should prefer the previous form over this form
> > +     as this form may be more confusing due to the same
> > +     notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
> > +     linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
> >       one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
> >       using HEAD instead.
>
> I think we're better off just consistently recommending "A..B" instead
> of "A B" and "fixing" any occurrence of the latter to the
> former. I.e. not taking this patch & going in the other direction.
>
> As noted in the thread you linked we'll always need ".." when one side
> is "HEAD" implicitly, and that's a really common case.

You could just type " @" instead of "..". And that one is easier to explain.

> So as confusing as the whole ".." v.s. "..." is in diff v.s. log I think
> we're worse off with "A B", since we'll *still* need to document the
> likes of "A.." and how that differs from log "A.." or "A...".
>
> So sometimes using the whitespace form for two revs and then the ".."
> when we just have one side makes things more confusing, not less. The
> reader will be left having to juggle more complexity in their head, not
> less.
-- 
Duy

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason]

On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Duy Nguyen wrote:

> On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 8:41 PM Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
> <avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Denton Liu wrote:
>>
>> > The documentation used to consider
>> >
>> >       git diff <commit> <commit>
>> >
>> > and
>> >
>> >       git diff <commit>..<commit>
>> >
>> > to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
>> > <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
>> > was confusing for some users (including me!).
>> >
>> > Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
>> > would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
>> > are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.
>> >
>> > Document the preference of the first form so that future confusion can
>> > be minimised.
>> >
>> > Signed-off-by: Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com>
>> > ---
>> >
>> > Thanks all on your feedback on the discussion thread[1]! I opted for
>> > just the documentation-only route so we don't break any valid use-cases.
>> >
>> > [1]: https://public-inbox.org/git/20190311093751.GA31092@archbookpro.localdomain/
>> >
>> >  Documentation/git-diff.txt | 6 +++++-
>> >  1 file changed, 5 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>> >
>> > diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
>> > index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
>> > --- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
>> > +++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
>> > @@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
>> >
>> >  'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
>> >
>> > -     This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
>> > +     This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
>> > +     users should prefer the previous form over this form
>> > +     as this form may be more confusing due to the same
>> > +     notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
>> > +     linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
>> >       one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
>> >       using HEAD instead.
>>
>> I think we're better off just consistently recommending "A..B" instead
>> of "A B" and "fixing" any occurrence of the latter to the
>> former. I.e. not taking this patch & going in the other direction.
>>
>> As noted in the thread you linked we'll always need ".." when one side
>> is "HEAD" implicitly, and that's a really common case.
>
> You could just type " @" instead of "..". And that one is easier to explain.

Sure, and if we're going to change our docs to consistently use @ at
either side of such ranges instead of the empty string for "HEAD" I
think that's worth discussing if the goal is to get rid of ".." for
"diff".

I'm commenting on the in-between state being more confusing to users,
which is as far as this patch gets us.

>> So as confusing as the whole ".." v.s. "..." is in diff v.s. log I think
>> we're worse off with "A B", since we'll *still* need to document the
>> likes of "A.." and how that differs from log "A.." or "A...".
>>
>> So sometimes using the whitespace form for two revs and then the ".."
>> when we just have one side makes things more confusing, not less. The
>> reader will be left having to juggle more complexity in their head, not
>> less.

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Junio C Hamano]

Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com> writes:

> Sure, and if we're going to change our docs to consistently use @ at
> either side of such ranges instead of the empty string for "HEAD" I
> think that's worth discussing if the goal is to get rid of ".." for
> "diff".
>
> I'm commenting on the in-between state being more confusing to users,
> which is as far as this patch gets us.

Yuck.  Let's not spread the @ disease.  We are not Perl where being
closer to line noise is somehow considered cool.  Spell it out as
HEAD, please.

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Elijah Newren]

On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 6:41 AM Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
<avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Denton Liu wrote:
>
> > diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> > index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
> > --- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> > +++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
> > @@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
> >
> >  'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
> >
> > -     This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
> > +     This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
> > +     users should prefer the previous form over this form
> > +     as this form may be more confusing due to the same
> > +     notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
> > +     linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
> >       one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
> >       using HEAD instead.
>
> I think we're better off just consistently recommending "A..B" instead
> of "A B" and "fixing" any occurrence of the latter to the
> former. I.e. not taking this patch & going in the other direction.
>
> As noted in the thread you linked we'll always need ".." when one side
> is "HEAD" implicitly, and that's a really common case.

By "really common" do you simply mean it is used by enough people that
it should be supported, or are you trying to claim something about
it's relative usage compared to "diff A B"?

> So as confusing as the whole ".." v.s. "..." is in diff v.s. log I think
> we're worse off with "A B", since we'll *still* need to document the
> likes of "A.." and how that differs from log "A.." or "A...".
>
> So sometimes using the whitespace form for two revs and then the ".."
> when we just have one side makes things more confusing, not less. The
> reader will be left having to juggle more complexity in their head, not
> less.

Here I think you are implying that "A.." or "..A" is somehow on a
similar magnitude of usage as "A B".  Is that accurate?  If that
reflected real-world usage, I would be more inclined to agree with
your course of action, but I can't fathom them having similar usage
rates.  Personally, I don't think I've ever seen any user use "A.." or
"..A" (well, except me), and only rarely even use "A..B"; with users I
have worked with and supported and taught, I'd guess "diff A B" is
used far more (at least an order of magnitude more) than any other
form, and that only some of them and only occasionally want to use
anything else, such as diffing against a merge base.

This whole topic came up again, IMO, because for the occasional
usecase of diffing against a merge-base, people's intuition leads them
to '..' instead of '...', and we wanted to fix or help avoid that
problem.  To me, your solution sounds like you want to instead embrace
the confusion: force people to deal with it early and often so that
they become trained on it and can articulate the differences between
'..' and '...' for both diff and log.  Is that accurate, or am I
misunderstanding/mis-stating your strategy?

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason]

On Mon, Mar 18 2019, Elijah Newren wrote:

> On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 6:41 AM Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
> <avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Denton Liu wrote:
>>
>> > diff --git a/Documentation/git-diff.txt b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
>> > index 72179d993c..10c7a2220c 100644
>> > --- a/Documentation/git-diff.txt
>> > +++ b/Documentation/git-diff.txt
>> > @@ -63,7 +63,11 @@ two blob objects, or changes between two files on disk.
>> >
>> >  'git diff' [<options>] <commit>..<commit> [--] [<path>...]::
>> >
>> > -     This is synonymous to the previous form.  If <commit> on
>> > +     This is synonymous to the previous form.  However,
>> > +     users should prefer the previous form over this form
>> > +     as this form may be more confusing due to the same
>> > +     notation having a logically conflicting meaning in
>> > +     linkgit:git-rev-list[1]-ish commands.  If <commit> on
>> >       one side is omitted, it will have the same effect as
>> >       using HEAD instead.
>>
>> I think we're better off just consistently recommending "A..B" instead
>> of "A B" and "fixing" any occurrence of the latter to the
>> former. I.e. not taking this patch & going in the other direction.
>>
>> As noted in the thread you linked we'll always need ".." when one side
>> is "HEAD" implicitly, and that's a really common case.
>
> By "really common" do you simply mean it is used by enough people that
> it should be supported, or are you trying to claim something about
> it's relative usage compared to "diff A B"?
>
>> So as confusing as the whole ".." v.s. "..." is in diff v.s. log I think
>> we're worse off with "A B", since we'll *still* need to document the
>> likes of "A.." and how that differs from log "A.." or "A...".
>>
>> So sometimes using the whitespace form for two revs and then the ".."
>> when we just have one side makes things more confusing, not less. The
>> reader will be left having to juggle more complexity in their head, not
>> less.
>
> Here I think you are implying that "A.." or "..A" is somehow on a
> similar magnitude of usage as "A B".  Is that accurate?  If that
> reflected real-world usage, I would be more inclined to agree with
> your course of action, but I can't fathom them having similar usage
> rates.  Personally, I don't think I've ever seen any user use "A.." or
> "..A" (well, except me), and only rarely even use "A..B"; with users I
> have worked with and supported and taught, I'd guess "diff A B" is
> used far more (at least an order of magnitude more) than any other
> form, and that only some of them and only occasionally want to use
> anything else, such as diffing against a merge base.
>
> This whole topic came up again, IMO, because for the occasional
> usecase of diffing against a merge-base, people's intuition leads them
> to '..' instead of '...', and we wanted to fix or help avoid that
> problem.  To me, your solution sounds like you want to instead embrace
> the confusion: force people to deal with it early and often so that
> they become trained on it and can articulate the differences between
> '..' and '...' for both diff and log.  Is that accurate, or am I
> misunderstanding/mis-stating your strategy?

Some of this thread's confusing, and on re-reading I see my reply hasn't
helped much.

To clarify. There's at least these things to consider:

1. What should the semantics of .. or ... be?
2. What semantics (regardless of syntax) should we recommend for common cases?
3. Depending on #1 and #2, can we make our docs less confusing?

My opinion:

1. I'd ideally like to switch the semantics of ".." and "...". I don't
   think anyone argues that it would be a bad thing in theory if we'd
   started out that way, Whether it's worth switching now is another
   matter.

   Junio chimed in in <xmqqmum0h88n.fsf@gitster-ct.c.googlers.com>
   saying he's not for it, so I'm assuming it's out for now.

2. I agree that we should generally recommend what's now "..." instead
   of "..", whatever the syntax is to invoke that.

3. And now, coming to the point I was trying to make. Assuming we'd like
   to go for #2 as I noted, and switching them around as in #1 is a
   no-go, what syntax should we prefer for "X..Z", aka. "X Y"?

   I think to reduce doc confusion we'd be better of using ".."
   consistently over the whitespace form, since we're going to need to
   show diffs with HEAD on one side. Using either "@" or "HEAD" there is
   more verbose.

   So yeah, I guess I am in a narrow sense advocating for embracing the
   confusion. I'd rather not have it in the first place, but since we
   seem stuck with it let's at least stick with and recommend *one*
   syntax for that confusion, and pick the one we can consistently use
   for 100% of our examples.

Anecdotally I've seen ".." in all forms be *way* more common among
users, even though if you sat them down and explained to them what it
does v.s. "..." they'd usually say they wanted the latter.

I did some brief scraping of .bash_history on one of our big shared
servers just now that has a lot of users (100-200) using git for daily
development. I've got many pages of things like "@{u}..",
"<tag1>..<tag2>", "<rev>.. -- <path>" etc. against just a couple of uses
of "...". The "<rev1> <rev2>" form gets a bit of use, but maybe 1/2 of
"..".

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Junio C Hamano]

Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com> writes:

> Some of this thread's confusing, and on re-reading I see my reply hasn't
> helped much.
>
> To clarify. There's at least these things to consider:
>
> 1. What should the semantics of .. or ... be?
> 2. What semantics (regardless of syntax) should we recommend for common cases?
> 3. Depending on #1 and #2, can we make our docs less confusing?

Nice way to summarise.

> My opinion:
>
> 1. I'd ideally like to switch the semantics of ".." and "...". I don't
>    think anyone argues that it would be a bad thing in theory if we'd
>    started out that way, Whether it's worth switching now is another
>    matter.
>
>    Junio chimed in in <xmqqmum0h88n.fsf@gitster-ct.c.googlers.com>
>    saying he's not for it, so I'm assuming it's out for now.

I do agree with the "in the ideal world, where we didn't have any
existing users and had perfect foresight back when invention of
three-dot form for 'log' was even a few months away down the road,
we would have used diff A...B for the two-endpoints", and I also
agree with "that is 10 years or more too late now---don't waste time
even pondering about it".
>
> 2. I agree that we should generally recommend what's now "..." instead
>    of "..", whatever the syntax is to invoke that.

I do not agree with this at all.  When I want to compare what is in
devel and what is in master, I may be interested in two completely
different things depending on why I am doing the comparison.

 - I may want to know "what is in the development track that is yet
   to be merged to 'master'".

 - Or I may be looking for "what is the difference between the master
   branch and the development branch."

The latter should match the former if 'devel' and 'master' means
what we generally think they are, and by looking at the latter, I
can find what would be missed if I wholesale replace 'master' with
'devel' before merging 'master' backwards into 'devel' to make the
latter catch up.  So even in that context, I would prefer to see the
latter (needless to say, the start-up cost is far less for the
latter than for the former).

When we discuss a more generic "two endpoints comparison" whose
relationship between the two endpoints is not as well-defined as
'devel' and 'master' (i.e. what does it mean to compare v1.2.1 and
v1.3.4?), I can phrase in human-understandable terms what ".." does,
but not what "..." does.  I have no idea how you or anybody can say
that "we should generally recommend" that the former is the norm and
two-endpoint comparison is an exception.

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Elijah Newren]

On Mon, Mar 18, 2019 at 12:07 PM Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
<avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 18 2019, Elijah Newren wrote:
>
> > On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 6:41 AM Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason
> > <avarab@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> On Sun, Mar 17 2019, Denton Liu wrote:
> >>

> Some of this thread's confusing, and on re-reading I see my reply hasn't
> helped much.
>
> To clarify. There's at least these things to consider:
>
> 1. What should the semantics of .. or ... be?
> 2. What semantics (regardless of syntax) should we recommend for common cases?
> 3. Depending on #1 and #2, can we make our docs less confusing?

That's a good framework; thanks for clarifying.  Junio has weighed in
already, but there were two other things I thought I'd still comment
on.  First, I think this list could use another item, related to #3:

4. Given backward compatibility and existing use-case constraints, is
there at least a way to warn users of possible confusion besides just
the docs?

I suggested one answer elsewhere in this thread (cf.
CABPp-BEy9nN=aV8Y+ueYqv299umHoF2E=8D7heJARM4Qa7P5JQ@mail.gmail.com);
not sure what others think of it yet.

> Anecdotally I've seen ".." in all forms be *way* more common among
> users, even though if you sat them down and explained to them what it
> does v.s. "..." they'd usually say they wanted the latter.
>
> I did some brief scraping of .bash_history on one of our big shared
> servers just now that has a lot of users (100-200) using git for daily
> development. I've got many pages of things like "@{u}..",
> "<tag1>..<tag2>", "<rev>.. -- <path>" etc. against just a couple of uses
> of "...". The "<rev1> <rev2>" form gets a bit of use, but maybe 1/2 of
> "..".

Wow, that is extremely surprising to me.  I have no mechanism to
access any such data (nor any mechanism for pushing new git versions
out to users other than sending out an email about new upstream
releases and asking them to update).  So, I did the next best thing
and sent out a poll to developers (all of whom use git daily); there's
a self-selection bias in the responses that probably tilts away from
novice users, but it's all I had:

Which do you use the most?
1.`git diff A B`    `11`
2. `git diff A..B`    `2`
3. `git diff A...B`
4. I never use any of these    `5`

The responses were 11 for #1 (with a number expressing in follow-ups
that it was the only form of these three they ever used, though some
still used other forms sometimes), 2 for #2 (one of whom responded to
requests for more details and found out he was using it wrong and that
he could save a character by using form #1 in cases where A was the
merge base, which he was happy about), 0 for #3, and 5 for #4.

That was still a lot more voting for the '..' form than I expected,
but still far less than what you have seen.  I wonder if there's a
regional difference?

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Elijah Newren]

Hi Denton,

Thanks for working on this.  Some thoughts...

On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 4:09 AM Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The documentation used to consider
>
>         git diff <commit> <commit>
>
> and
>
>         git diff <commit>..<commit>
>
> to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
> <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
> was confusing for some users (including me!).
>
> Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
> would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
> are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.

Yes, there were multiple people who commented that they liked to
copy-paste the "A..B" output from fetch/pull in combination with diff
and log (even though one suggested that this gave the wrong output and
what they really wanted was "diff A...B").

However, "removal of functionality" isn't the only form of
deprecation/warning.  Updating the manpage is another one which you
implemented, but I'd like to suggest yet another: Prefix the diff with
a warning message, e.g.

"WARNING: You ran 'git diff A..B' (which means the same thing as 'git
diff A B').  Many users confuse 'git diff A..B' and 'git diff A...B'.
Please see 'git diff --help' for more details."

Having extra text (e.g. commit message or warning) at the beginning of
the diff does not prevent tools like patch(1) or git-apply(1) from
successfully applying it, it still makes sense to humans (and who as
an added bonus happen to be really good at filtering out common
messages if they do encounter them more than a few times), and gives
us a chance in the future to figure out how to potentially extend the
message to make it a deprecation warning and/or provide details about
how to change the behavior of '..' to either be an error or behave
like triple dots or just not warn.


Elijah

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Denton Liu]

Hi Elijah,

Sorry for the late reply, I've been mulling over it for the past couple
of days.

On Mon, Mar 18, 2019 at 10:59:56AM -0700, Elijah Newren wrote:
> Hi Denton,
> 
> Thanks for working on this.  Some thoughts...
> 
> On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 4:09 AM Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > The documentation used to consider
> >
> >         git diff <commit> <commit>
> >
> > and
> >
> >         git diff <commit>..<commit>
> >
> > to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
> > <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
> > was confusing for some users (including me!).
> >
> > Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
> > would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
> > are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.
> 
> Yes, there were multiple people who commented that they liked to
> copy-paste the "A..B" output from fetch/pull in combination with diff
> and log (even though one suggested that this gave the wrong output and
> what they really wanted was "diff A...B").
> 
> However, "removal of functionality" isn't the only form of
> deprecation/warning.  Updating the manpage is another one which you
> implemented, but I'd like to suggest yet another: Prefix the diff with
> a warning message, e.g.
> 
> "WARNING: You ran 'git diff A..B' (which means the same thing as 'git
> diff A B').  Many users confuse 'git diff A..B' and 'git diff A...B'.
> Please see 'git diff --help' for more details."
> 
> Having extra text (e.g. commit message or warning) at the beginning of
> the diff does not prevent tools like patch(1) or git-apply(1) from
> successfully applying it, it still makes sense to humans (and who as
> an added bonus happen to be really good at filtering out common
> messages if they do encounter them more than a few times), and gives
> us a chance in the future to figure out how to potentially extend the
> message to make it a deprecation warning and/or provide details about
> how to change the behavior of '..' to either be an error or behave
> like triple dots or just not warn.
> 
> 
> Elijah

I was originally planning on doing something like this (by warning to
stderr, but your idea actually gets to the user ;) ). The only thing I'm
worried about for a change like this is that it'll be very controversial
since, as we could see anecdotally, a lot of people have trained
themselves to use the .. form.

In terms of backwards compatibility, I think that there's the
possibility of breaking some scripts by doing this change but we could
mitigate this by detecting if we're outputting to a terminal and only
print the message in that case.

Thanks for the suggestion!

Denton

Re: [PATCH] git-diff.txt: prefer not using <commit>..<commit>

[Elijah Newren]

Hi Denton,

On Wed, Mar 20, 2019 at 10:28 AM Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi Elijah,
>
> Sorry for the late reply, I've been mulling over it for the past couple
> of days.

No worries; thanks for thinking about it.

> On Mon, Mar 18, 2019 at 10:59:56AM -0700, Elijah Newren wrote:
> > On Sun, Mar 17, 2019 at 4:09 AM Denton Liu <liu.denton@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > The documentation used to consider
> > >
> > >         git diff <commit> <commit>
> > >
> > > and
> > >
> > >         git diff <commit>..<commit>
> > >
> > > to be equal counterparts. However, rev-list-ish commands also use the
> > > <commit>..<commit> notation, but in a logically conflicting manner which
> > > was confusing for some users (including me!).
> > >
> > > Deprecating the notation entirely is not really an option because it
> > > would be an arduous process without much end-value. In addition, there
> > > are some valid use-cases that we don't want to break.
> >
> > Yes, there were multiple people who commented that they liked to
> > copy-paste the "A..B" output from fetch/pull in combination with diff
> > and log (even though one suggested that this gave the wrong output and
> > what they really wanted was "diff A...B").
> >
> > However, "removal of functionality" isn't the only form of
> > deprecation/warning.  Updating the manpage is another one which you
> > implemented, but I'd like to suggest yet another: Prefix the diff with
> > a warning message, e.g.
> >
> > "WARNING: You ran 'git diff A..B' (which means the same thing as 'git
> > diff A B').  Many users confuse 'git diff A..B' and 'git diff A...B'.
> > Please see 'git diff --help' for more details."
> >
> > Having extra text (e.g. commit message or warning) at the beginning of
> > the diff does not prevent tools like patch(1) or git-apply(1) from
> > successfully applying it, it still makes sense to humans (and who as
> > an added bonus happen to be really good at filtering out common
> > messages if they do encounter them more than a few times), and gives
> > us a chance in the future to figure out how to potentially extend the
> > message to make it a deprecation warning and/or provide details about
> > how to change the behavior of '..' to either be an error or behave
> > like triple dots or just not warn.
>
> I was originally planning on doing something like this (by warning to
> stderr, but your idea actually gets to the user ;) ). The only thing I'm
> worried about for a change like this is that it'll be very controversial
> since, as we could see anecdotally, a lot of people have trained
> themselves to use the .. form.
>
> In terms of backwards compatibility, I think that there's the
> possibility of breaking some scripts by doing this change but we could
> mitigate this by detecting if we're outputting to a terminal and only
> print the message in that case.

I don't see why anything would break if we just always showed the
warning.  git diff's purpose is to create a "patch", and as such can
be used by the patch(1) command.  We added additional headers in 'git
diff' relative to diff(1), but it's still understandable by patch.  We
also created git-apply because it could potentially make use of the
extra headers to do slightly smarter stuff than patch.  But both allow
arbitrary extra initial text as long as it doesn't have the relevant
start-of-next-diff-hunk characters.  Extra text at the beginning (an
explanation or a commit message or a warning or whatever) thus doesn't
change it from being a valid patch.

Human beings will see a little extra text by default, but they already
usually skip right over the diff headers when reading; this is
essentially just another diff header.  And we could provide them with
a config option to turn it off if they used it all the time and found
the two extra lines of text annoying.

Since both Ævar and I noted that even among people who use '..' lots
of them use it erroneously, it seems like a worthwhile warning to add,
to me at least.  That is, unless I've misunderstood my purpose of
'git-diff' as creating a patch or missed something else important.


Anyway, just my $0.02.  (And I'd be happy to take this on later if you
don't want to).
Elijah