Re: [PATCH] cmd_reset: don't trash uncommitted changes unless told to

On 6/25/08, Junio C Hamano [off-list ref] wrote:

"Avery Pennarun" [off-list ref] writes:

 > How about making "git checkout" default to HEAD if no revision is
 > supplied?  There's precedent for this in, say, git-diff (and I think a
 > few others).

Won't fly.  'git checkout -- "$@"' is to revert to the last staged
 version.

Ah, I didn't catch the difference between HEAD and index there.

  * You say "git checkout -- file" when you want to "check out the file
   from the index";

The real question here is the --.  Is it strictly needed?  It's
optional in things like git-diff, which just do their best to guess
what you mean if you don't use the --.

If reset and checkout made the -- optional, then you could do:

git reset filename         # undo an accidental "add"
git checkout filename  # undo accidental modifications that haven't been added

...and save git reset --hard for people willing to take that risk.
(The fact that git-gui includes git reset --hard as a really
easy-to-click GUI command scared me the first time I saw it, too.)

I think simplifying the syntax might help to make the role of the
index less mysterious in the whole "revert" operation.  It's not
obvious to me at all whether a revert-file ought to get the one from
HEAD or the one from the index.  But I can easily understand and
explain checkout (copy index to working copy) and reset (undo an add).

Thanks,

Avery