On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 09:41:06AM -0400, Theodore Ts'o wrote:

On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 03:23:54AM -0500, Felipe Contreras wrote:
Creating a ~/.gitconfig file if one doesn't already is one I agree
with, and at least on Unix systems, telling them that the config file
lives in ~/.gitconfig, or where ever it might happen to be on other
platforms, is a good one.  If it's in some really weird place on
Windows, then sure, we can tell them about "git config -e".  But the
point is to let the user look at the default .gitconfig file, where we
can put in comments to help explain what is going on, and perhaps have
links to web pages for more information.

I think the idea of a commented gitconfig is a good solution. We could
include default aliases commented, so that a new user would just have to
uncomment them. That way, he will understand they are aliases and not
commands, learn how to tune them to its own needs and it won't annoy
anyone because they will be commented by default, ideally with explicit
commentaries around them.

Furthermore, this could be a good way to show a new user all the
possibilities of git, or at least its configuration. Documentation is a
good thing when you know what you are looking for, but when you are
beginning, you don't know what can be done, and reading a complete and
commented example configuration could be a good way to discover it.