Re: Suggested new feature for ci

[Thien-Thi Nguyen]

() Keith Thompson <address@hidden>
() Mon, 8 Nov 2010 12:36:47 -0800

   The "-m" option of the "ci" command makes it difficult to specify
   an empty log message.  A workaround I often use is
       ci -l filename < /dev/null

   Note that "cvs commit" has a similar "-m" option, but the log message
   is always given as a separate argument, not bundled with the option.
   Just copying that behavior for ci would probably break too many
   existing scripts.

Yes, that way is problematic.

   One possible solution, though it's a bit ugly, might be to define
   behavior for an argument consisting of just "-m" (which is currently
   an error):

       -mmsg       Uses "msg" as the message.
       -m          Uses the following argument as the message.

   So
       ci -m '' foo
   would check in "foo" with an empty log message, and a non-empty message
   could be given either as:
       ci -mmessage foo
   or
       ci -m message foo

Interesting idea.  It doesn't seem ugly by itself, at first glance, but
it being different from all the other options is indeed a disadvantage.

Another idea is to check an env var (say, RCS_DEFAULT_LOG_MESSAGE)
to use prior to throwing "missing message for -m option" error.
What do you think of that?