Re: [PATCH v2 00/10] port branch.c to use ref-filter's printing options

[Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>]

Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@grenoble-inp.fr> writes:

> Karthik Nayak <karthik.188@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> On Mon, Oct 12, 2015 at 6:06 AM, Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> wrote:
>>> Karthik Nayak <karthik.188@gmail.com> writes:
>>>
>>>> On Fri, Oct 9, 2015 at 11:59 PM, Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> wrote:
>>>> ...
>>>> Also does it make sense to integrate these changes here? Or would you like to
>>>> have another series on this?
>>>
>>> I do not think you would want to ask that question, as my answer
>>> would most likely be "The most preferable would be a series to clean
>>> up the existing codepath that deals with %(align) first, on top of
>>> which everything in flight that is not yet in 'next' is rebased."
>>
>> Ah, but I might take a while to get there, So I'd rather push code which
>> is almost ready and work on that slowly, if that's ok?
>
> That's OK to me. The "most preferable way" above would lead to a cleaner
> history, but also more work for you and for me as a reviewer.

I do not think the cleanliness of the resulting history is of prime
concern.  At least, that was not where my preference came from.

If you design a new infrastructure to help refactoring early
(i.e. before adding many copies of code that need to be cleaned up
later), it would make the work of reviewing of the design of the
helper and refactoring using that helper smaller, not larger.  And
the new codepaths that use the helper would become easier to follow
(otherwise we wouldn't be doing such a refactoring in the first
place), making the reviews easier.  That is where my preference
comes from.

There _is_ a sunk-cost that has already been invested in reviewing
the older round that added code that needs to be cleaned up; there
are some parts other than the "need to be cleaned-up" parts that we
would feel confortable having in the reroll without having to
re-review them.  I do not know if that is a very high cost, though,
especially for those who have already seen the previous rounds.

Anyway, I wouldn't insist and we can go either way.