doc: make clear --assume-unchanged's user contract

Many users misunderstand the --assume-unchanged contract, believing
it means Git won't look at the flagged file.

Be explicit that the --assume-unchanged contract is by the user that
they will NOT change the file so that Git does not need to look (and
expend, for example, lstat(2) cycles)

Mentioning "Git stops checking" does not help the reader, as it is
only one possible consequence of what that assumption allows Git to
do, but

   (1) there are things other than "stop checking" that Git can do
       based on that assumption; and
   (2) Git is not obliged to stop checking; it merely is allowed to.

Also, this is a single flag bit, correct the plural to singular, and
the verb, accordingly.

Drop the stale and incorrect information about "poor-man's ignore",
which is not what this flag bit is about at all.

Signed-off-by: Philip Oakley <philipoakley@iee.org>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
This commit is contained in:
Philip Oakley 2014-12-06 15:04:30 +00:00 committed by Junio C Hamano
parent 9181365b85
commit ccadb25f73

View File

@ -78,20 +78,18 @@ OPTIONS
Set the execute permissions on the updated files.
--[no-]assume-unchanged::
When these flags are specified, the object names recorded
for the paths are not updated. Instead, these options
set and unset the "assume unchanged" bit for the
paths. When the "assume unchanged" bit is on, Git stops
checking the working tree files for possible
modifications, so you need to manually unset the bit to
tell Git when you change the working tree file. This is
When this flag is specified, the object names recorded
for the paths are not updated. Instead, this option
sets/unsets the "assume unchanged" bit for the
paths. When the "assume unchanged" bit is on, the user
promises not to change the file and allows Git to assume
that the working tree file matches what is recorded in
the index. If you want to change the working tree file,
you need to unset the bit to tell Git. This is
sometimes helpful when working with a big project on a
filesystem that has very slow lstat(2) system call
(e.g. cifs).
+
This option can be also used as a coarse file-level mechanism
to ignore uncommitted changes in tracked files (akin to what
`.gitignore` does for untracked files).
Git will fail (gracefully) in case it needs to modify this file
in the index e.g. when merging in a commit;
thus, in case the assumed-untracked file is changed upstream,