Re: [PATCH 1/1] commit: add support to provide --coauthor

[Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de>]

Hi,

On Wed, 9 Oct 2019, Jeff King wrote:

> On Wed, Oct 09, 2019 at 11:19:47AM +0900, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>
> > > I wonder how we are supposed to use this trailer in the Git project,
> > > in particular in combination with Signed-off-by.  Should all
> > > (co)authors sign off as well?  Or will Co-authored-by imply
> > > Signed-off-by?
> >
> > I think we have been happy with (1) a comment at the end of the log
> > message that says X worked together with Y and Z to produce this
> > patch, and (2) the trailer block that has S-o-b: from X, Y and Z,
> > without any need for Co-authored-by: trailer so far, and I do not
> > see any reason to change it in this project.
>
> One advantage to making a machine-readable version is that tools on the
> reading side can then count contributions, etc. For instance:
>
>   https://github.com/git/git/commit/69f272b922df153c86db520bf9b6018a9808c2a6
>
> shows all of the co-author avatars, and you can click through to their
> pages.

FWIW I really like this. It bugged me ever since that GitMerge talk
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usQgAy8YDVA) that we did not have any
standardized way to document co-authored commits.

> > If other projects wants to use such a footer, that's their choice,
> > but I am fairly negative to the idea to open the gate to unbounded
> > number of new options for new trailer lines.  We do not even have
> > such options like --acked=<acker>, --reported=<reporter>, for the
> > trailers that are actively used already (and to make sure nobody
> > misunderstands, I do not think it is a good idea to add such
> > individual options).
>
> Yeah, I'd agree that we should start first with a generic trailer line.
> There might be some advantage to building trailer-specific intelligence
> on top of that (for instance, it would be nice for coauthor trailers to
> expand names the way --author does). But that can come after, and might
> not even be in the form of specific command-line options. E.g., if the
> coauthor trailer could be marked in config as "this is an ident", then
> we we would know to expand it. And the same could apply to acked,
> reported, etc.

Yep, and we have to start somewhere. I think this patch is a good start.

FWIW I would not even mind introducing the synonym `--co-author` for
`--coauthor`. But that's just a very minor suggestion.

Ciao,
Dscho