
 Is this a good commit message? - skeltoac
http://core.trac.wordpress.org/changeset/23105
======
cjensen
No. People don't read commit logs for fun. They read them to try to find the
source of a bug or who changed a line last and what they thought they were
doing.

This breaks that functionality in two ways:

1\. Recognizing the joke takes attention, which therefore means I have less
attention available to track the thing I'm really hunting. The thing I'm
hunting may take a lot of "state info" in my brain so I need that
concentration. A commit log of "fix typo" can be quickly ignored without
interrupting my brain state.

2\. The commit log is not self-explainatory. You have to look at the diff to
understand the joke. The whole point of a commit log is to summarize the
change so I _don't_ need to look at the diffs unless the commit is related to
the functionality I'm investigating.

"Fix typo" followed by the joke would have been acceptable.

~~~
sophacles
Sometime's I feel like I'm the only person who understands code. Seriously, I
don't look at comments, api docs, or commit logs unless I am unsure what the
diff or code is telling me. I mean, joking with something this trivial is not
really a big deal. There is no hidden motivation to change it, no hard to
follow changes, no clever bits of code that are subtly altered. An output
string is now without a typo. Big whoop.

The only complaint that makes sense is "it's not that funny".

~~~
qeorge
I hate this attitude. Really do. Its a cancer.

You're not "the only person who understands code", you're the person who
refuses to write good documentation based on a misplaced sense of superiority.

Get over yourself.

~~~
sophacles
You've seen my pull requests then? When I write code for work or anyone but me
I make sure it's well done. Just because I don't like it doesn't mean I don't
do it.

E.g.:

<https://github.com/marionettejs/backbone.marionette/pull/346>

for my most recent.

So quit with the negative bullshit attitude and realize that you haven't a
clue about what you're saying.

Also note it isn't superior nothing. I'm just genuinely baffled that people
are so hesitant about looking at code for a solution. No mater how good the
dox I don't understand til I've read the code. Also note how in my linked
example residing the docs was way less useful than just looking at the code.
Not because the marionette ppl are the evil dancer you whine about but because
they are ppl and sometimes things slip

~~~
jeremysmyth
> I'm just genuinely baffled that people are so hesitant about looking at code
> for a solution. No mater how good the dox I don't understand til I've read
> the code.

Let me help.

The code you look at to find the solution might be one 20 or 30 line chunk of
Ruby that performs a service for a chunk of 10 year old VB or 20 year old Perl
or 30 year old C, or some chain of several languages. A support guy, or apps-
level documenter, or maintenance programmer adding a feature, or architect
integrating with another system, or business integration consultant helping to
decide where the business needs to invest, or some other decision maker
really, really doesn't have time to read through 40,000 lines of code in
several languages to find out how a feature works.

For example: one of my first jobs was with an established big brand with many
years of legacy data and organic "enterprise" systems, integrating data
produced by an AS400 green-screen application into VB (on a Windows box) by
copying (via FTP on a SCO box) a fixed-width text file produced by a shell
script on the AS400, and parsing it so we could put it into Oracle for
processing by a C++ application with API hooks into a Nortel Meridian coms
system. When an outbound call goes to the wrong number, where's the bug?

Even if I'm reading _my own_ code 6 or 36 months later, I'm much happier if
I've logged the checkins correctly so that it narrows it down to which dozen
or so of many thousands of commits touched a feature. Whenever I've had to
track down someone else's bug, or tried to justify the technical justification
for some business decision the system makes, or tried to write high level
progress documentation (think changelog for senior managers), the commit
messages make the difference between it taking two weeks and taking two years
(i.e. never happening).

It's easy to think, in the post-codial glow when you're fresh from the zone,
that there's no way this code isn't absolutely obvious. I've been that guy.
I've also been the guy that cursed that guy for making it hard to find the
needle in the haystack. I've even been both guys separated by 18 months.
Commit messages can make the difference between getting it done in 20 minutes,
and "looking at code for a solution" for two days.

I hope you're less baffled now :)

------
georgeorwell
I don't know. The writing is okay, there weren't any spelling mistakes that I
noticed, but the use of three words written in only capital letters was
somewhat disconcerting. I'd say if the author wants to get it accepted for
publication somewhere reasonably mainstream he's going to need someone else
working at arm's length who is willing to take the time to go through it and
highlight areas for revision and expansion before sending it back to him. The
author and this person might need to repeat the process a few times.

~~~
mdpye
Subsides -> subsists. Not strictly spelling, but definitely a mistake...

Otherwise a pretty awesome commit message. Better than my personal most used
(before work moved to git and let me rewrite local history): "oops, forgot to
add the new file" and "oops, fix up the bloody test"...

~~~
nacin
Yup, I realized the typo this morning. Hanging my head in shame. In fairness,
this message was written at 4am after working for 18 hours straight (and 63 of
the previous 84 hours, according to rescuetime).

~~~
mdpye
In terms of git features, I think I value correcting embarrassing typos in my
commit messages higher than fixing typos in my code! They're a lot more
frequent due to the fast and loose typing, and lack of a compiler on my back.

~~~
chc
If you're working in PHP, you should be used to fast and loose typing (also
the lack of a compiler unless you work at Facebook).

~~~
saraid216
That was a terrible pun and you are a bad person and should feel bad.

------
thezilch
No, the initial part of the message should be a short log that does not exceed
78 characters. /monocle

------
asdfaoeu
What is this the anti-fun brigade?

~~~
maw
Sounds like a reasonable question, actually: _is_ it a good commit message?
I'm really not sure, but am inclined towards yes.

~~~
saraid216
It's a terrible commit message, but for the case it was fixing, seriously, why
care? If I found it in something I was working on, I'd laugh and _move on with
my life_.

------
yakiv
The English word "apron", as I understand it, used to be "napron". "A napron"
eventually shifted to "an apron". See
<http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Napron>.

~~~
xnxn
That's funny, the reverse process created the word "nuncle" from "mine uncle".
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nuncle>

------
peterjmag
At least it's not something entirely useless like "updated", "w00t", "oops",
"test", or " ". (And yes, I've come across all of those in the wild.)

~~~
nsxwolf
"Latest updates"

~~~
zalew
some fixes

~~~
zbowling
WIP

~~~
FuzzyDunlop
"Commit that shit", after watching the wire.

~~~
tobych
various changes (not tested)

~~~
georgeorwell
hi

~~~
ardiyu07
(space)

------
mixedbit
This indeed is an issue of extreme importance. I'm afraid only Linus Torvalds
is qualified to pass a judgement on the quality of this commit message.
Fortunately, he isn't quick to judge:
[https://github.com/torvalds/linux/pull/17#issuecomment-56599...](https://github.com/torvalds/linux/pull/17#issuecomment-5659970)
;)

------
malkia
It is a joke, but one of the best commit message I've seen lately is from
PostgreSQL - for example from Tom Lane - where each bug, or new feature is
explained well. I wish I can write such. My commit messages are terrible to my
home projects, at least at work I'm following some established rules and it's
easier there...

~~~
nacin
I write good commit messages that are serious, too. Only a few hours earlier:
<http://core.trac.wordpress.org/changeset/23083>

~~~
skeltoac
I love you for giving yourself props.

------
fleitz
Sure, it's great! It's somewhat funny and really long.

It will take up lots of time for those dumb enough to try to find bugs by
reading commit messages rather than use a the proper tool for the job which
would of course be: git/svn bisect.

------
zalew
it's not hosted on github, so by hn standards I don't know if it can be
qualified as an opensource contribution at all.

------
dkasper
It was a joke: <https://twitter.com/nacin/status/276769136829423616>

~~~
zalew
thanks for clarifying, I was just about to investigate this issue.

------
michaelfeathers
Yes.

------
tokipin
whats wrong with 1

