Show HN: Git-Add–Interactive with Enhancements

73 points by xn 2 days ago | 36 comments
I created a replacement for the perl git-add--interactive that adds a few enhancements:

- S to automatically split all hunks

- G to set a global filter on hunks to show

- A to automatically accept all hunks (after auto-splitting and global filter are applied)

  • strogonoff 2 days ago
    I used to hate leaving Vim for Git’s interactive staging mode or some separate GUI to pick apart a hairy set of changes. As a result I usually tried to avoid these messy situations.

    Then I discovered Vim fugitive. It allows to go through the diff and stage chunks so intuitively, it changed the way I work. Just j/k to move around, = to expand file, s to stage selection, c to commit. The process of reviewing changes became very natural and actually enjoyable. I like the feeling of control it gives and how it makes focused commits painless while not disrupting the flow.

    • kccqzy 2 days ago
      And if you use magit for Emacs, it's also extremely easy to stage hunks selectively and easily: s to stage, cc to commit staged, ca to amend with staged, etc. This is the way: don't use the git CLI. Use your editor.
      • pi-rat 1 day ago
        Frankly, it’s so good I use emacs just for git even when coding in other editors.
    • Ayesh 2 days ago
      Congratulations on publishing this. I use `git add -p` quite a lot, and this project looks interesting!

      I knew that you could place a `git-xyz` executable and you can call it as `git xyz`. I didn't know you could do it with flags !?!

      A small video or some screenshots would help a lot. If you can record interactivity with ascii-cinema, that will be even better.

    • loevborg 2 days ago
      This is my favorite alias:

          i = !git add -N . && git add -p
      
      `git i` lets you interactively add new files as well as existing ones
      • jdlyga 2 days ago
        It would be nice if this had the same interface for `git add -i` allowing you to type in numbers or letters.

        ** Commands **

          1: status   2: update   3: revert   4: add untracked
        
          5: patch   6: diff   7: quit   8: help
        
        What now>

        This allows you to either type in (p) or (5) to go into patch mode.

      • sevg 2 days ago
        This looks neat!

        I think it’ll fit nicely alongside scmpuff which I’ve been using for years (and at this point refuse to ever give it up): https://github.com/mroth/scmpuff

        • areusch 2 days ago
          the thing i really wish existed was git add -p mode that automatically segmented unstaged changes into a series of fixups based on the blame of the surrounding area that changed. this wouldn't work in all cases, but in many cases, i've made a series of 3-4 clearly-separable changes, i then go and make fixes on top of all of them, and now i want to fixup each change.
        • p_wood 2 days ago
          I like the idea of 'G' to filter hunks. The perl script does not exist since git v2.40.0 so I don't think the installation instructions work for recent versions of git as there is no way to stop 'git add -p' from running the builtin version. I see this is MIT licenced but the code is very closely based on the perl script which is licensed under the GPLv2.
          • xn 2 days ago
            huh. I guess this is a prototype for features that will have be submitted to the upstream version. There was a feature in development for something like `git add -G <regex>`, maybe a decade ago, that never got completed.

            As for licensing, I'm happy to change the license. I have no strong feelings on the subject, and don't know what restrictions GPLv2 imposes on a port to another language.

          • treve 2 days ago
            The one feature I would love to see and would be an instant-install, is a command that lets me revert a hunk back. It would be nice to be able to wipe out some dangling console.log() statements as I go through the changes.
            • lucasoshiro 2 days ago
              Question: why not send this to the Git mailing list, and hopefully get this in upstream?
              • williamdclt 2 days ago
                I don’t think the Git maintainers will consider adding Go as a dependency and having commands in a new language.

                Or at least, it would require first a massive effort to align the maintainers on the idea of a new language, like Rust in the Linux kernel

                • xn 2 days ago
                  I updated my calendar to revisit in 2045.
                  • imiric 1 day ago
                    Or just improve the Perl version? There's no reason this needs to be written in Go.
                    • lucasoshiro 2 days ago
                      > I don’t think the Git maintainers will consider adding Go as a dependency

                      Just re-write in C

                      • williamdclt 2 days ago
                        This "just" carries a lot of weight.

                        And that's probably not enough: for example likely you'd need to reuse whatever Git uses to generates patch formats. It's not necessarily _hard_, but it's not "just" a language translation.

                        • xn 2 days ago
                          Maybe someone will create modernperl, à la modernc, to automatically port go to perl.
                          • derintegrative 2 days ago
                            "Just"
                        • xn 2 days ago
                          After banging on it a bit more, yes, it would be nice to replace the upstream version.
                      • muxxa 2 days ago
                        My 2c: I'd like to see git add interactive go through the hunks in order of most recent first!
                        • yencabulator 1 day ago
                          How do you define hunk recency when comparing a staged file vs file on disk?
                        • jasonjmcghee 2 days ago
                          I'm a serial "git add -p" user. (Micro-review before every commit is super healthy imo).

                          I made an alias a while ago I use frequently:

                              af       => !f() { git add -p $(git diff --name-only | fzf); }; f
                          
                          
                          When you have a large diff, it's get unruly quickly to "add -p".

                          This just prompts you with a fuzzy find of the files that have changed and you can just pick one to go through the "add -p" process for that file.

                          For the terminal averse, IDEs usually have "jump to next change" and a tab for the changed files that can achieve the same.

                          • Night_Thastus 2 days ago
                            I used to do patch operations and hunk-editing for everything and really enjoyed it. It definitely helps to put a fresh view on the code and see anything missed.

                            Eventually I moved on to going line-by-line with a GUI tool. In my case Git-cola, but I'm not positive I'd recommend it because it's quite slow on Windows.

                            • h1fra 2 days ago
                              same I just wish it would split things even more by default
                              • 2 days ago
                              • zacharytamas 2 days ago
                                I always love to see these little git extensions. For anyone else interested in this stuff, here are some others I like:

                                lazygit (of course): https://github.com/jesseduffield/lazygit

                                git-machete: https://github.com/VirtusLab/git-machete

                                rebase-editor: https://github.com/sjurba/rebase-editor

                                • G1N 2 days ago
                                  Been looking for something like git machete for the longest time, thanks for sharing!
                                  • 2 days ago
                                  • halpow 2 days ago
                                    [dead]
                                    • wapeoifjaweofji 2 days ago
                                      I've used `tig` for this sort of thing for well over a decade. `tig status` lets you see all files, interactively add things, whatever.
                                      • 29athrowaway 1 day ago
                                        I have been using tig for years. Great software
                                        • foobarbaz33 2 days ago
                                          Another tig user! Proof there are 1's of us out there.
                                          • 2 days ago
                                          • RadiozRadioz 2 days ago
                                            [flagged]
                                            • 2 days ago