Re: Git-aware HTTP transport

[Nicolas Pitre <nico@cam.org>]

On Thu, 28 Aug 2008, Shawn O. Pearce wrote:

> "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com> wrote:
> > Shawn O. Pearce wrote:
> >> "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> I *think* the "native" git protocol uses binary here.  It makes sense 
> >>> to  be consistent, to allow them to share code?
> >>
> >> No, the native protocol is horribly verbose here:
> >>
> >> 	0032want ac3abe10ed54d512fbbaeb7cef19972eedd8e4a8
> >> 	...
> >>
> >> so its doing it in hex, and its using 10 bytes of "framing" for
> >> every SHA-1 it sends as each is sent in its own pkt-line with the
> >> have/want header.
> >
> > Hm.  It's probably not enough data to worry significantly about.
> 
> Should I change the HTTP protocol then to use the same format,
> so they have a better chance at sharing code between them?

Given that the ref exchange happens on multiple lines (one ref per line) 
in the native protocol, and that your proposal is using one line for 
multiple refs, I don't see this as a big factor wrt code reuse.  Since 
you'll have separate "output" code anyway, why not simply going with 
refs in straight binary for the HTTP protocol?  Even the debugability of 
refs exchange in plain text is dubious especially with all refs on the 
same line (that'll be a pain to split refs out of a long stream of hex 
by hand).


Nicolas