On 2015-06-03 11.55, Ed Avis wrote: > Jeff King <peff <at> peff.net> writes: > >> I would say the more "usual" way to use checkout like this >> is to give specific paths. I.e., run "git status", say "oh, I need to >> restore the contents of 'foo', but not 'bar'", and run "git checkout >> foo". That works regardless of the type of change to "foo" and "bar". > > That seems fine - a specific file is named and you clearly want to alter > the contents of that file. By analogy, 'rm foo' will silently delete it, > but if you specify a directory to delete recursively you need the -r flag. > OK, it's not a perfect analogy because the purpose of rm is to delete data > and nothing else ;-). > > If my personal experience is anything to go by, newcomers may fall into the > habit of running 'git checkout .' to restore missing files. In the old days > I would often delete a file and then run 'cvs update' or 'svn update' to > restore it. That would fetch a fresh copy from the repository, and while > it might do some kind of diff/patch operation on modified files, it would > not simply throw away local changes. > > 'git checkout .' seems like the analogous command, but it has much sharper > edges. I still think it should be safer by default, but if you decide > against that then perhaps you need to create some way to restore missing > files and not overwrite others. 'git checkout --no-overwrite'? Then it > could even be added to .gitconfig as the default for those who like it. > > I have to say that as a newcomer to git I do not like the idea of creating > a special undo log for git. It would just be yet another concept to learn > and another thing to add to the list of 'where is git hiding my data this > time?'. And the time when it would be useful - after some bungled operation > that lost data - is just the time when the user is already confused and > adding another semi-hidden stash of objects to the mix would befuddle them > further. If there is to be a backup made of local changes that get lost, > and I agree it is a good idea, then it should be something stupid and > completely obvious, such as saving the old file as 'foo.before_checkout.1'. > This is what my Git says: git status On branch master Changes not staged for commit: (use "git add/rm <file>..." to update what will be committed) (use "git checkout -- <file>..." to discard changes in working directory) modified: A deleted: B (So it should be somewhat self-documenting) I try to avoid things like "git reset --hard", and "git checkout .", and often use "git stash" instead. It may be that there is a chance to improve the documentation. Just for curiosity: >From where did you got the information to run "git checkout ." ? -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html