Re: use of temporary refs in resolve

Junio C Hamano [off-list ref] wrote:

Here is my understanding of various "temporary heads" left
directly underneath $GIT_DIR:

    HEAD      : updated only after successful auto merge.

    ORIG_HEAD : records the head value before resolve started.
                if automerge fails, this is the same as HEAD,
                but after successful automerge, this can be used
                to see what the previous head was.  This is the
                first parent of the resulting commit.

    MERGE_HEAD: present if auto merge is unsuccessful and
		records the other head being merged.

    LAST_MERGE: present if merge is unsuccessful or impossible and
		records the other head being merged.

Is FETCH_HEAD going to be preserved by the git-fetch-script operation?
It should be, unless, git-pull-script removes it or it is changed to
do the fetch as well.

In a repository managed with StGIT (i.e. updated with 'stg pull'), the
base of the stack is always the same with FETCH_HEAD and StGIT uses
this file. I also find it quite useful for:

  gitk ORIG_HEAD..FETCH_HEAD

to only see the remote commits since the local StGIT patches are
always seen as commits on top of the FETCH_HEAD. It's also useful for
people using 'git rebase'.

-- 
Catalin