Hi Ævar,

On Tue, 14 Sep 2021, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 13 2021, Johannes Schindelin wrote:
>
> > On Mon, 13 Sep 2021, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason wrote:
> >
> >> On Thu, Sep 09 2021, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason wrote:
> >>
> >> > In the summary I had on v1->v2 points 1-3 are for v2->v3,
> >> > respectively, outstanding, addressed, outstanding:
> >> >
> >> >     https://lore.kernel.org/git/877dfupl7o.fsf@evledraar.gmail.com/
> >> >
> >> > In addition the discussion ending here:
> >> > https://lore.kernel.org/git/nycvar.QRO.7.76.6.2109082112270.55@tvgsbejvaqbjf.bet/
> >> >
> >> > For that point: I think it's fair enough not to properly handle the
> >> > cleanup case in "scalar clone", but perhaps add a note in the
> >> > commit message that unlike "git clone" this is known not to clean
> >> > after itself properly on ctrl+c?
> >>
> >> Seeing [1] about the planned re-roll I have the above a shot a few
> >> days ago, see the original discussion at [2] (indirectly linked
> >> above).
> >
> > There is a good reason why I did not engage in that tangent about
> > deviating from the established `contrib/*/Makefile` paradigm: I find
> > it particularly unrelated to what this here patch series is trying to
> > accomplish, and I cannot bring myself to be interested in the proposed
> > build system changes, either, because I do not see any benefit in the
> > changes, only downsides.
> >
> > I find the distraction unnecessary.
>
> Perhaps I'm reading too much between the lines here, so forgive any
> undue knee-jerk reaction.

Okay, let's try an analogy.

Imagine that a person is asking for directions to the train station. And
the other person is replying by asking "did you know that this train
station was built in 1878? It is actually quite interesting a story...
[and then goes on to describe the history and what excites them about
it]". Now, the first person tries again to ask for directions, again does
not get an answer to that question, and is slowly starting to look at
their watch. The second person, being completely oblivious to all of this,
goes on with their wonderful story about the train station and its
cultural heritage. So the first person walks a bit further to ask a third
person, but the second person is not done yet and says "but you haven't
heard me out! That's disrespectful!".

Just imagine for a minute how you would feel if you were the first person.

And that is how I feel asking for reviews about the Scalar patch series
and then being forcefully dragged into that tangent about the build
process.

I find the well-established paradigm to keep contrib/'s build procedures
as confined to their own directory as possible the most reasonable way to
handle the build by virtue of _not_ polluting the top-level Makefile
unnecessarily. All of your objections strike me simply as personal
viewpoints, not as technical arguments, and they fail to address this
"pollution of the top-level Makefile" problem. I therefore strongly
disagree with your suggestion that the build system should be changed, I
would even argue that your suggestion should been dismissed on purely
technical grounds, and I wish you hadn't forced me to say this as
forcefully.

And even if I looked more favorably on your suggestion to change the build
procedure, I find this distraction about the build as little constructive
as the explanations about the train station's history above. Those
suggestions do succeed in derailing the conversation about how Git could
scale better, how Scalar _does_ teach Git how to scale better, and about
how to teach Git itself more and more of Scalar's tricks.

If you have ideas how to teach, say, `git clone` to perform a couple of
Scalar's tricks, by all means, let's hear them, or even better, let's see
those patches. If you want to change the build system, still, I cannot
stop you from sending patches to that end to the Git mailing list, but
please expect me to be uninterested in them in any way, and to prefer to
spend my efforts to improve Git elsewhere. If you have other ideas how to
improve on Scalar in a user-perceptible way, however, I am all ears again.

I hope this clarifies it, without the need to read between the lines,
Johannes