Subject: Re: [PATCH 5/5] cat-file: Introduce new option to delimit output with NUL characters

From: Junio C Hamano <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 12 Jun 2023 12:12:16 -0700

Patrick Steinhardt <[email-masked]> writes:

>> > That being said I'd be fine to change this series to mean "-Z changes
>> > stdout" if you insist. In that case we should be pointing out in our
>> > documentation that "You should never use `-z` without `-Z` when you
>> > process arbitrary input".
>> 
>> You are not making sense.  If we were to leave them orthogonal to
>> keep flexibility, it is because there can be cases where using '-Z'
>> without using '-z' (and vice versa) makes sense; "you should never"
>> has no place to live in such a world.
>
> Well, that's exactly what I'm arguing: I don't think it does make sense
> to keep them orthogonal.

I was not commenting on that.

My "you are not making sense" was because you said "I'd be fine to
make -Z to mean 'stdout is NUL delimited'".  If somebody thinks it
is a good idea to make '-Z' mean 'stdout is NUL delimited without
affecting how the input is delimited', it can only be because that
somebody thinks that it makes sense to make input and output
orthogonal.

It is perfectly OK if you are not fine to make -Z to affect only the
standard output stream.  That stance is at least self consistent.