new status output

[James Blackwell]

On Tue, Oct 18, 2005 at 03:37:06PM -0700, Robey Pointer wrote:
> >>Just a reminder because this always makes me panic. :)
> >>
> >>Please don't use svn's cryptic
> >>    F Q  something.c
> >>     Z   foo.c
> >>    CY   bar.c
> >>notation.  We can afford to spell out words describing the status.
> >>
> >
> 
> Yeah, when this came up before, the column format was proposed.  I  
> just wanted to reiterate it because the mailing list keeps growing. :)

I hear your point, Robey. Getting a pile of alphabet soup is frustrating.
I do think, though, that the solution you're proposing is worse than the
problem you're trying to solve. The fact is that we can't afford to spell
out words describing the status, as by the time you get two or three
mutually independant statuses (imagine types of modification, 'fer
instance), you've take up half of the screen width listing them out. Worse
yet, the more flags you're trying to replace with verbose words, the worse
the solution gets.

I think the problem that svn (and to a similiar, though lesser extent,
bazaar 1.x) is that its hard to figure out what those flags actually
mean.

Would it be helpful to you if there were some sort of option to the
various commands that show these flags to append a key explaining what the
flags mean? For example (i'm being sloppy with the flags): 

$ bzr status --explain

  M    thisfile
 R     that file
   C   another file
+      yetanother file
-      more files

Explanation of flags: 
M - File was modified         +  file is now controlled
R - File was renamed          -  file no longer controlled
C - file is conflicted


With the flags right there in the sources, they're sure to be kept up to
date.

Would that work for you?


> >Now someone's inevitably going to come with request to localize  
> >those names:
> >
> >přidán foo.c
> >změněn foo.h
> >přidán bar.c
> >změněn bar.h
> 
> Ahh, in fact, that's a great argument against using "A"/"G"/etc. :)  
> When they're meaningful at all, they're only meaningful to someone  
> well-versed in english.*  Whereas the full word "added" can be pasted  
> into babelfish for an instant translation.

Imagine this though (I'm being a little sloppy here with whats possible
when, but the concept applies)

Added Renamed Modified             somedirectory/subdir/anotherdir/file 
                       Conflicted  somedirectory/subdir/anotherdir/file2

(one keeps different types of changes in different fields for easy parsing
by external third party programs)

> * Actually I consider myself fluent in english (AMERICAN ENGLISH,  
> sjr!) and I still haven't got a clue what "G" stands for...  
> "gathered"? "grew"?