Subject: Re: [PATCH] Documentation/git-reset.txt: Use HEAD~N syntax everywhere (unify examples)

From: Jakub Narebski <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Feb 2008 16:28:16 -0800 (PST)

Jari Aalto <[email-masked]> writes:

> * Sun 2008-02-03 Dmitry Potapov <[email-masked]>
> * Message-Id: [email-masked]
>>
>> ^-syntax is very natural to specify the _previous_ commit. Have you
>> notice we usually say "previous", not "one commit before"?

And you usually say "yesterday", "the day before" and not "1 day ago",
"2 days ago".

<rev>^  means (first) parent of commit-ish <rev>, or 'previous' commit.
<rev>~N means Nth parent in first-parent line of commit-ish <rev>; as
you can see full explanation is decidely longer.

> Only if you're grown with git. Everywhere else the concept of HEAD or
> TIP is more natural, thus progression:
> 
>     HEAD, HEAD~1, HEAD~2

The fact that other SCMs are poorer in expressive power doesn't mean
that we have to bend backwards and follow (well, not braindamaged,
just poor) other SCM limitations / conventions. Git is git is git :-)

So "everywhere else" doesn't matter any... unless in "SCM rosetta" or
something like that chapter in Git User's Manual.

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland
ShadeHawk on #git