Subject: Re: [PATCH v4 3/7] scalar: validate the optional enlistment argument

From: Junio C Hamano <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 May 2022 12:29:13 -0700

Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <[email-masked]> writes:

> Both are built by our main build process, and thus should have
> corresponding adjustments in our main test code, just as is already the
> case for both "git" and "test-tool".
>
> But even if that wasn't the case I'd still be of the view that we should
> add "scalar" to that list.
>
> It's just a matter of potential time sinks in the future. If we
> introduce a hidden segfault in the scalar code and don't notice for some
> time because we're using that test pattern that's going to suck, and
> likely to waste a lot of time. We might even ship a broken command to
> users.
>
> Whereas having "scalar" on that list is going to be a relatively easy
> matter of grepping and doing some boilerplate changes if and when we
> ever "git rm" it entirely, or "promote it" from contrib or whatever.

In addition, it already is an actual time sink that causes us send a
lot more bytes back and forth than the number of bytes necessary to
send a reroll that adds one liner to the same step.

> I also think that just getting rid of that whitelist entirely is an
> acceptable solution. Perhaps it's just being overzealous in forbidding
> everything except "git", we should still not use it for the likes of
> "grep", but we could just leave that to the documentation.

It indeed is tempting entry into a slippery slope, and I'd see it as
a change bigger than we could comfortably make as a "while at it"
change.

We can stop arguing and instead send in a reroll that squashes in
something like this, which shouldn't be controversial, I would say.

 t/test-lib-functions.sh | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git i/t/test-lib-functions.sh w/t/test-lib-functions.sh
index 93c03380d4..8899eaabed 100644
--- i/t/test-lib-functions.sh
+++ w/t/test-lib-functions.sh
@@ -1106,7 +1106,7 @@ test_must_fail_acceptable () {
 	fi
 
 	case "$1" in
-	git|__git*|test-tool|test_terminal)
+	git|__git*|scalar|test-tool|test_terminal)
 		return 0
 		;;
 	*)