Subject: Re: Git terminology: remote, add, track, stage, etc.

From: Miles Bader <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2010 13:49:06 +0900

Matthieu Moy <[email-masked]> writes:
> We already came up with a better wording, namely "upstream", and used
> in in "git push --set-upstream".  Probably a next step would be to
> deprecate any other occurence of --track meaning the same thing

That doesn't make much sense to me; "upstream" and "track" are not
alternatives; rather, they're complementary:  "upstream" is a _thing_,
and "track" is an _action_ -- one _tracks_ _upstream_.  "--track", then,
merely implies "upstream", which seems fine to me, as I'm not sure
there's anything else it could refer to.

I think the original post, while well-meaning is a bit overwrought, and
reflects the difficulty in learning any new system as much as it does
any inconsistency in git's terminology[*] -- Git's huge sin, after all
(judging from most complaints I see about it), is that It Doesn't Use
Exactly The Same Model (and thus Terminology) That CVS Did...

[SVN's great sin, of course, is that It Does (interpret "CVS" liberally
here).]

[*] Git is certainly guilty of using inconsistent terminology --
cached/staged/index/yada is my personal complaint -- but I don't think
to anywhere near the degree implied by that post.

-Miles

-- 
Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.