From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox•com>
To: Meet Soni <meetsoni3017@gmail•com>
Cc: git@vger•kernel.org, ps@pks•im, shejialuo@gmail•com,
karthik.188@gmail•com
Subject: Re: [GSoC][RFC PATCH 0/2] Add refs list subcommand
Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2025 13:10:36 -0700 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <xmqqldp9m1mr.fsf@gitster.g> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAPhwyn01spdT-hFxVPcr4cnwBJ=YL3Ty-johXvGKXKRdCTpHXg@mail.gmail.com> (Meet Soni's message of "Mon, 30 Jun 2025 09:23:44 +0530")
Meet Soni <meetsoni3017@gmail•com> writes:
> To clarify, I don't have specific options or improvements in mind right now.
> The idea behind mentioning them was to acknowledge that having a consolidated
> interface like git refs might open the door to such discussions.
One complaint we heard a lot about Git in the past (I do not know if
people got used to and learned to live with, or they are still
complaining about the same these days) was that there were always
multiple ways to do related things slightly differently.
The machinery of for-each-ref is shared by branch and tag to give
them feature-parity. Adding yet another command that behaves
slightly differently, with the intention to make it diverge even
more in the future, feels going backwards.
> The primary motivation here is to make ref-related commands discoverable at a
> single entry point - git refs, rather than scattered across several top-level
> commands. The aim is to improve disoverability and set the stage for
> potential future
> cleanup or enhancements, should the community find value in doing so.
We need to be a bit careful. There was a case that went in a
totally opposite direction. Even though a single command was there
in the beginning that can be used to pick a specific thing out of
the histories stored in a repository to externalize it in the file
system to be worked on, it was later split into two commands as
folks thought it would make it more discoverable.
Even though branches, tags, and symbolic refs like HEAD are all
refs, from the point of view of end-users, they are different things
built on top of the same underlying mechanism. The fact that they
share the underlying mechanism does not necessarily mean that a
single same command is easier to discover and work on them to the
users.
It may not hurt too much to have "enumerate all refs, and for each
ref, allowing to limit them or to sort them with some criteria, and
show them in a customizable format" as "git refs list", but we do
need to keep the feature parity with "git for-each-ref". Adding
unnecessary subtle differences would only confuse users.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2025-06-30 20:10 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 68+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2025-06-27 7:49 [GSoC][RFC PATCH 0/2] Add refs list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-06-27 7:49 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH 1/2] builtin/refs: add " Meet Soni
2025-06-27 16:27 ` Jean-Noël Avila
2025-06-27 18:13 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-06-30 4:28 ` Meet Soni
2025-06-29 11:05 ` [PATCH] doc:git-for-each-ref: fix styling and typos Jean-Noël Avila
2025-06-30 15:48 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-06-30 18:55 ` Jean-Noël AVILA
2025-06-27 7:49 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH 2/2] t: add test for git refs list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-06-27 18:03 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH 0/2] Add " Junio C Hamano
2025-06-28 8:05 ` shejialuo
2025-06-30 14:05 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-07-06 12:58 ` shejialuo
2025-06-30 3:53 ` Meet Soni
2025-06-30 20:10 ` Junio C Hamano [this message]
2025-07-09 13:36 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-07-17 7:50 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v2 " Meet Soni
2025-07-17 7:50 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v2 1/2] builtin/refs: add " Meet Soni
2025-07-17 16:48 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-07-23 5:01 ` Meet Soni
2025-07-17 7:50 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v2 2/2] t: add test for git refs " Meet Soni
2025-07-17 21:01 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-07-23 5:17 ` Meet Soni
2025-07-23 15:03 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-07-23 6:43 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v3 0/3] Add " Meet Soni
2025-07-23 6:43 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v3 1/3] builtin/refs: add " Meet Soni
2025-07-24 5:58 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-07-24 16:01 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-07-25 11:10 ` Meet Soni
2025-07-23 6:43 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v3 2/3] t6300: refactor tests to be shareable Meet Soni
2025-07-23 6:43 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v3 3/3] t: add test for git refs list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-07-31 9:00 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 0/5] Add " Meet Soni
2025-07-31 9:00 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 1/5] doc: factor out common option Meet Soni
2025-07-31 9:00 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 2/5] builtin/for-each-ref: factor out core logic into a helper Meet Soni
2025-08-01 5:54 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-08-04 6:34 ` Meet Soni
2025-07-31 9:00 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 3/5] builtin/refs: add list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-08-01 13:27 ` Phillip Wood
2025-08-01 14:43 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-08-01 15:49 ` Phillip Wood
2025-08-01 17:14 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-08-04 9:28 ` Phillip Wood
2025-08-04 6:32 ` Meet Soni
2025-08-04 9:27 ` Phillip Wood
2025-08-04 15:35 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-07-31 9:00 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 4/5] t6300: refactor tests to be shareable Meet Soni
2025-07-31 9:00 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 5/5] t: add test for git refs list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-08-01 5:54 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v4 0/5] Add " Patrick Steinhardt
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 0/6] " Meet Soni
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 1/6] doc: factor out common option Meet Soni
2025-08-04 18:34 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 2/6] builtin/for-each-ref: align usage string with the man page Meet Soni
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 3/6] builtin/for-each-ref: factor out core logic into a helper Meet Soni
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 4/6] builtin/refs: add list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 5/6] t6300: refactor tests to be shareable Meet Soni
2025-08-04 9:22 ` [GSoC][RFC PATCH v5 6/6] t: add test for git refs list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 0/6] Add " Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 1/6] doc: factor out common option Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 2/6] builtin/for-each-ref: align usage string with the man page Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 3/6] builtin/for-each-ref: factor out core logic into a helper Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 4/6] builtin/refs: add list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 5/6] t6300: refactor tests to be shareable Meet Soni
2025-08-05 9:27 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 6/6] t: add test for git refs list subcommand Meet Soni
2025-08-05 13:07 ` [GSoC][PATCH v6 0/6] Add " Patrick Steinhardt
2025-08-05 16:12 ` Junio C Hamano
-- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2025-06-14 7:05 [GSoC][RFC PATCH 0/2] " Meet Soni
2025-06-14 23:45 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-06-17 11:51 ` Meet Soni
Reply instructions:
You may reply publicly to this message via plain-text email
using any one of the following methods:
* Save the following mbox file, import it into your mail client,
and reply-to-all from there: mbox
Avoid top-posting and favor interleaved quoting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Interleaved_style
* Reply using the --to, --cc, and --in-reply-to
switches of git-send-email(1):
git send-email \
--in-reply-to=xmqqldp9m1mr.fsf@gitster.g \
--to=gitster@pobox$(echo .)com \
--cc=git@vger$(echo .)kernel.org \
--cc=karthik.188@gmail$(echo .)com \
--cc=meetsoni3017@gmail$(echo .)com \
--cc=ps@pks$(echo .)im \
--cc=shejialuo@gmail$(echo .)com \
/path/to/YOUR_REPLY
https://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-send-email.html
Be sure your reply has a Subject: header at the top and a blank line
before the message body.
This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox