Phillip Susi [off-list ref] writes:
I was wondering why am's scissors option is not enabled by default.
It is very easy to miss misidentification of scissors line; as a
dangerous, potentially information losing option, I do not think it
should be on by default.
Another reason (and this is the original one) why it is not enabled
is to discourage the contributors from overusing scissors -- >8 --
line. If you always have to write too much stuff before the proper
explanation of your patch, so that the integrator has to use -c
option all the time, you are explaining your patches wrong.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
On 01/08/2013 05:42 PM, Junio C Hamano wrote:
It is very easy to miss misidentification of scissors line; as a
dangerous, potentially information losing option, I do not think
it should be on by default.
I suppose if it only requires one instance of >8 or <8 and one -, it
might be *slightly* dangerous, but if it required a slightly longer
minimum line length, it would be pretty darn unlikely to get triggered
by accident, and of course, is easily disabled.
Another reason (and this is the original one) why it is not
enabled is to discourage the contributors from overusing scissors
-- >8 -- line. If you always have to write too much stuff before
the proper explanation of your patch, so that the integrator has to
use -c option all the time, you are explaining your patches wrong.
I often see patches being tweaked in response to feedback and
resubmitted, usually with a description of what has changed since the
previous version. Such descriptions don't need to be in the change
log when it is finally applied and seem a perfect use of scissors.
Usually such version to version descriptions are put in a cover
letter, but if you are only submitting a single patch instead of an
entire series, using a cover letter seems silly when you could just
put the comments in one email and clearly mark them as not needing to
go into the final changelog.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.11 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: Using GnuPG with undefined - http://www.enigmail.net/
iQEcBAEBAgAGBQJQ7KriAAoJEJrBOlT6nu755UkIALIT3T5yHH5i+0HOrXLlXzQR
+S2jJfFZ8Kcc+kleiEJ3uLFVGTLMpRyjJFKceOuB4/TdJFUivrYJHWJxcKmW8WzK
BJKZOjt/jv9r8Qt/AB7KA45S7awfQnOWkg6KQlJa1IM0nUPbo4upgMlWar9l7vjz
Hkr7geuHY4fsVUJ7R0rYPcT3pue8ywsT4a9o/ocstfXmC05IrLKQtzO4TuvfiaTb
yBG+rAPKz36zfxCN5NyKExZO6v/LnCKym/PH4a6wYIeTUz1EvuaPy5lQOo6ORQ4h
xbSyBRDPN4yiVgNXfSQmGKwd9XPqs6h8Z0q3X5mGZyOXurw0JFRJlJ3v8hHIvqg=
=Rn7z
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----