On Mon, Jan 2, 2017 at 11:05 AM, Paul Sbarra <sbarra.paul@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: >> I would have expected `git difftool --submodule=diff ...` to work... What >> are the problems? > > The docs for difftool state... > "git difftool is a frontend to git diff and accepts the same options > and arguments." I think such a sentence in the man page is dangerous, as nobody was caught this issue until now. There have been numerous authors and reviewers that touched "diff --submodule=<format>, but as there is no back-reference, hinting that the patch is only half done, and the difftool also needs to implement such an option. We should reword the man page either as "git difftool is a frontend to git diff and accepts the most(?) options and arguments." or even be explicit and list the arguments instead. There we could also describe differences if any (e.g. the formats available might be different for --submodule=<format>)