Re: On the adoption of transient.el

[Dmitry Gutov]

Hi Juri,

On 06.08.2021 02:20, Juri Linkov wrote:

> While I think Magit is a great package for discoverability etc.
> I found that it's completely sufficient to use just the shell-command.
> With the persistent history of the previously constructed git commands
> using a flex-style completion on previous commands will even reduce
> the need in some vc commands, e.g.
>
> 'M-! chm TAB' runs `git checkout master` (instead of C-x v r)
> 'M-! pur TAB' runs `git pull --rebase`   (instead of C-x v P)
> ...

Same here (except for the flex completion).

> Currently I'm finishing implementation of a new vc command that
> will allow committing from a diff buffer.  So for example, after
> displaying all changes with e.g. 'C-x v D' you can remove
> some unneeded hunks (with e.g. 'M-k' 'diff-hunk-kill'),
> then on the remaining hunks type 'C-c C-c' in the diff buffer.
> It will create a usual *vc-log* buffer where typing 'C-c C-c'
> will commit only changes from the diff buffer.

This is a very welcome development.

> Internally
> it works by running three git commands:
>
> `git stash push -m stash_name -- list_of_file_names_from_diff`
> `cat diff_buffer.patch | git am` # should also handle return code

Somewhere around here, I suppose you will pop up the usual log-edit buffer?

> `git stash pop -q`

For your consideration, here's a description of the strategy used by the 
venerable commit-patch command/package:

https://github.com/caldwell/commit-patch/blob/master/commit-patch#L212-L214

- Let the user edit a diff in the diff-mode buffer
- Save it to a file
- 'git apply --cached', to put the contents to the staging area
- 'git commit'

It might have some advantages, such as less chance of something going 
awry with the user's stashes due to a coding error (current, or one 
possibly introduced in the future).

On the flip side, I suppose it will be harder to reuse the existing 
'checkin' backend function. Or generalize the exact approach to other 
backends, since only Git has staging area.