Re: [PATCH] MyFirstContribution: use switch for changing branches

[Emily Shaffer <nasamuffin@google.com>]

On Tue, Apr 9, 2024 at 9:11 AM Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> wrote:
>
> Benji Fisher <benji@fisherfam.org> writes:
>
> > I was under the impression that the new "git switch" and "git restore"
> > commands were recommended in most cases instead of "git checkout".
>
> These two were added so that eventually we have something we can
> recommend to new users, but as a pair of experimental commands, we
> reserve the rights to update their UI in backward incompatible ways
> (meaning: those who use them may need to retrain their fingers and
> update their scripts if they used them---not that using these
> Porcelain commands in scripts is a good idea to begin with).
>
> So your justification could be
>
>     We want to evantually be able to recommend restore/switch to new
>     users, and want to take advantage of every opportunity to polish
>     them.
>
>     Because this document is not exactly for totally new users, and
>     the readers are expected to be knowledgeable enough and highly
>     motivated in improving git, let's have them use these
>     experimental commands and report newbie-issues they found using
>     them, so that we can gain more experience and chances to polish
>     the command and eventually make them recommendable to new users.
>
> Note that the "WHY?" in my response was not "I see no reason to do
> this", but "You need to say why you think this is a good idea here
> in the proposed commit log message".  Without your version of
> reasoning, my conclusion was "I do not see a point", but with a
> justification like this (there could be others---it is contributor's
> job to explain why a proposed change is a good idea, not mine), I
> can understand the reasoning why this change may be a good one.

For what it's worth, when I wrote this doc I was new enough to hacking
Git that I did not know about the new experimental commands ;) or else
I would have used them. I am not opposed to pointing them out in this
doc as part of general evangelism towards a nice UX improvement (and
that could be good justification for the commit message, if you agree,
Benji).

 - Emily