Re: [RFC PATCH] Introduce "precious" file concept

[Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>]

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

> I don't think something like the endgame you've described in
> https://public-inbox.org/git/xmqqzhtwuhpc.fsf@gitster-ct.c.googlers.com/
> is ever going to work. Novice git users (the vast majority) are not
> going to diligently update both .gitignore and some .gitattribute
> mechanism in lockstep.

That goes both ways, no?  Forcing people to add the same pattern,
e.g. *.o, to .gitignore and .gitattribute to say they are
expendable, when most of the time they are, is not something you
should expect from the normal population.

>> I would think that a proper automation needs per-path hint from the
>> user and/or the project, not just a single-size-fits-all --force
>> option, and "unlike all the *.o ignored files that are expendable,
>> this vendor-supplied-object.o is not" is one way to give such a
>> per-path hint.
>>
>>> This would give scripts which relied on our stable plumbing consistent
>>> behavior, while helping users who're using our main porcelain not to
>>> lose data. I could then add a --force option to the likes of read-tree
>>> (on by default), so you could get porcelain-like behavior with
>>> --no-force.
>>
>> At that low level, I suspect that a single size fits all "--force"
>> would work even less well.
>
> Yeah I don't think the one-size-fits-all way out of this is a single
> --force flag.

Yes, indeed.  That's why I prefer the "precious" bit.  The system
would behave the same way with or without it, but projects (not
individual endusers) can take advantage of the feature if they
wanted to.