gh-f VS Git

gh-f is a GitHub CLI extension that I wrote that does all-things-fzf for git. From time to time I add new small features or quality of life adjustments :).

If you are into github CLI extensions, check out the ultimate fzf git extension: gh-f (unrelated to neovim, but shamelessy I am the author).

I deal with most of my git workflow from terminal simply because I find git to be easiest to use from the command line, where each command is verbose enough for you to understand what you are doing, and so is its output. Lately, with the introduction of the gh CLI things have gotten even easier, and all the workflow of branches, PRs, releases, runs and so forth is easily handled via command line as well: I wrote gh-f, an extension that integrates gh with fzf and you're good to go at the speed of light.

I have worked on gh-f for about one year and I have now reached the point where I consider it to be stable and robust enough to award it a full 1.0.0 release.

You may want to check out gh-f, where most of the functions/alias shown in the videos are packaged as gh CLI extension.

Nice, wasn't aware of that. Enjoying looking at the code underneath https://github.com/gennaro-tedesco/gh-f/blob/master/gh-f

gh cli with some gh extensions, like gh-f, gh-s, and gh-i, can get you most of the way there

If you are interesting in cherrypicking (and much more) you may want to have a look at gh-f, a GitHub CLI extension that works with fzf (in particular look at gh f -k)

Another feature added to gh-f: grep regex pattern through revision history. What about that piece of code you deleted, and now you want to quickly check the old revision file to copy and paste? Say no more: prompt for regex pattern, choose the file name, browse the revision history with preview and show the old file containing the piece of code you are after!

Boy, I can't find this either (but also, the kernel mailing list is _really_ difficult to search). I really remember Linus saying something like "it's not a real SCM, but maybe someone could build one on top of it someday" or something like that, but I cannot figure out how to find that.

You _can_ see, though, that in his first README, he refers to what he's building as not a "real SCM":

https://github.com/git/git/commit/e83c5163316f89bfbde7d9ab23...

Here is the direct link, as HN somehow removes the query string: https://github.com/git/git/commits?author=peff&since=2023-10...

I understand all that.

I'm saying, if you write a survey and one of the possible answers is "diff", but you don't clearly define what you mean by "diff", then don't be surprised if respondents use any reasonable definition that makes sense to them. Ask an ambiguous question, get a mishmash of answers.

The thing that Git uses for packfiles is called a "delta" by Git, but it's also reasonable to call it a "diff". After all, Git's delta algorithm is "greatly inspired by parts of LibXDiff from Davide Libenzi"[1]. Not LibXDelta but LibXDiff.

Yes, how Git stores blobs (using deltas) is orthogonal to how Git uses blobs. But while that orthogonality is useful for reasoning about Git, it's not wrong to think of a commit as the totality of what Git does, including that optimization. (Some people, when learning Git, stumble over the way it's described as storing full copies, think it's wasteful. For them to wrap their heads around Git, they have to understand that the optimization exists. Which makes sense because Git probably wouldn't be practical if it lacked that optimization.)

The reason I'm bringing all this up is, if you're trying to explain Git, which is what the original article is about, then it's very important to keep in mind that someone who is learning Git needs to know what you mean when you say "diff". Most people who already know Git would tend to gravitate toward the definition of "diff" that you're assuming (the thing that Git computes on the fly and never stores), but people who already know Git aren't the target audience when you're teaching Git.

---

[1] https://github.com/git/git/blob/master/diff-delta.c

Didn't Git have a new default merge strategy, `ort` https://github.com/git/git/blob/master/Documentation/RelNote... ?

Yes, but you are referring to standalone scripts, not functions defined within a Bash script.

Compare for example the following helper code used for git command completion inside Bash and inside PowerShell.

Bash: https://github.com/git/git/blob/master/contrib/completion/gi...