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Gitless: an experimental version control system built on top of Git

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Re: Gitless: an experimental version control system built on top of Git

#15
post #7

It looks like there's no concept of a stage, which would imply that commits can only be made at a file level. This nerfs the single greatest feature of git: git add -p

git add -p could just be replaced with git commit -p without adding a stage. Although it doesn't seem like this is what Gitless does at the moment.

Re: Gitless: an experimental version control system built on top of Git

#17
post #9

So... what advantages does this provide over straight Git? Reading the docs, it doesn't appear to abstract over Git at all.

From what I can see: easier control over tracked/untracked status of files; no stage (might be considered a disadvantage, though I'll wager a good interactive commit feature would render a stage unnecessary), automatically commit everything by default, much simpler concept of what a branch is and isn't; no fetch at all, just merge. I like this experiment quite a lot. It's clearly very incomplete and lacking of featur…

I see, so they are experimenting with the user experience, probably by examining assumptions and see how much can be cut away and still be functional.

Re: Gitless: an experimental version control system built on top of Git

#19

A nice project: Git is a wonderful version control system, but the git cli (the porcelain) definitely has some annoyances. I think submodules, for example, are completely broken at the CLI level. I don't think this project necessarily goes far enough though; the biggest change I saw was getting rid of the staging area. Whether or not that's a good idea, I was hoping for crazier ideas! For example, how about something…

I think git-subtree is a better approach than what submodules are doing. Adding a submodule breaks things. E.g. `git clone` stops working as it should. In contrast, git-subtree doesn't break anything, because it just merges another repo history into the main repo:

https://github.com/apenwarr/git-subtree

(also in git contrib/)

Re: Gitless: an experimental version control system built on top of Git

#20
post #7

It looks like there's no concept of a stage, which would imply that commits can only be made at a file level. This nerfs the single greatest feature of git: git add -p

git add -p could just be replaced with git commit -p without adding a stage. Although it doesn't seem like this is what Gitless does at the moment.

I would think that this is exactly what's expected in an experiment like this.
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