Re: [PATCH] push: don't guess at qualifying remote refs on deletion

Jeff King [off-list ref] writes:

Instead, we can just be more succinct and say "we can't
delete this because we couldn't find it". So before:

  $ git push origin :bogus
  error: unable to push to unqualified destination: bogus
  The destination refspec neither matches an existing ref on the remote nor
  begins with refs/, and we are unable to guess a prefix based on the source ref.
  error: failed to push some refs to '$URL'

and now:

  $ git push origin :bogus
  error: unable to delete 'bogus': remote ref does not exist
  error: failed to push some refs to '$URL'

This is telling a truth ($GIT_DIR/refs/bogus does not exist) but not
the whole truth; while I tend to agree that it is better than the
original (especially with ", and we are unable to guess..." part),
given that the above request would delete refs/tags/bogus or
refs/heads/bogus if they existed on the "origin", I am a bit worried
that it may send an incorrect message to novice users.

    unable to delete 'bogus': no branch or tag with that name

might allay my worries, but I am not extremely happy with that
wording, either.

I think this would help. I used "remote ref does not exist"
because that is the simplest explanation for the user.
However, given that we will try to push a fully qualified
ref that does not exist, a more accurate message might
"destination refspec did not match" or something similar.  I
prefer the former, though, as it less arcane.

Yeah, I do understand why you phrased that way, but still..