On 24/08/06 10:11AM, Junio C Hamano wrote: > Junio C Hamano <gitster@xxxxxxxxx> writes: > > > Patrick Steinhardt <ps@xxxxxx> writes: > > > >> I always have to wonder how helpful it really is to print the usage > >> information in such a context. I feel that it is too distracting because > >> in many cases, we end up printing dozens of lines of options that drown > >> out the single line of information that the user actually cares for, > >> namely why the command has failed. > > Yes. I do not think I found it useful to give the single-line > message, blank line, followed by the full usage text even a single > time myself. I tend to also agree. The printed usage information is rather noisy and makes it more challenging to find the information that is actually relevant. I would be in favor of supressing the usage information altogether. If we did want to provide some sort of breadcrumb for users, maybe we could print a one-liner explaining how to fetch detailed usage information for a command if desired? Overall it would still be a lot less noisy. -Justin
