Re: [PATCH 00/11] [RFC] config-batch: a new builtin for tools querying config

On 2026-02-04 at 14:19:52, Derrick Stolee via GitGitGadget wrote:

This RFC explores a new git config-batch builtin that allows tools to
interact with Git's config data with multiple queries using a single
process. This is an orthogonal alternative to the effort to create a stable,
linkable config API. Both approaches have different strengths.

My main motivation is the performance of git-credential-manager on Windows
platforms as it can call git config get dozens of times. At 150-200ms per
execution, that adds up significantly, leading to multiple seconds just to
load a credential that already exists. I believe that there are other
benefits to having this interface available, but I can't recall any
specifics at the moment.

This RFC adds git config-batch with a protocol over stdin/stdout for
executing multiple config queries. The implementation has a limited set of
potential queries, but also creates a model for compatibility for tools to
automatically adapt to different Git versions.

I'm submitting this as an RFC before I've polished all of the details
because I want to make sure I'm going down a good direction. Please focus
feedback in these questions:

 * Is this a worthwhile feature to add to Git?

Git LFS has the same needs, but I believe it can use `git config -l -z`
to do that and parse the config options itself.  If this is just config
fetching, I'm not sure of the additional utility that such a feature
would add.  If that interface _almost_ meets your needs, could we add
functionality there instead of a new interface?

If you need to set many keys, I'm curious as to why that is.
-- 
brian m. carlson (they/them)
Toronto, Ontario, CA