[darcs-devel] [issue2224] if there are a lot of changes in a file, offer to record all? (add a "tips" system?)

[Mark Stosberg]

Mark Stosberg <mark at summersault.com> added the comment:

One design option:  

When darcs record is run, it would check to see if the "suppress record 
tips" file exists somewhere under _darcs.

If not, a more verbose intro with tips is provided. 

Like some programs do, you could offer the user some options after 
displaying the tips:
"Would you like see these tips again next time you run 'darcs record'" ?

If they say "no", update the "suppress record tips" file, and they get 
the current behavior.

One question is whether you are OK with existing users seeing the tips 
once, or if you want to make sure that only new users see it.

As spec'ed above, existing users would see it once as well. They might 
not need the tips, but seeing a tip once after after upgrade is 
minimally annoying. 

If you wanted to keep open the the possibility of having tips for every 
command, you might use a single "tips" file, with boolean values for 
each command. 

I think I would personally appreciate this commands I used less 
frequently or new commands, like "optimize" or "rebase".

There are two different use-cases here:

1. The "first run" case, where extended detail on the common options is 
helpful.
2. The ongoing case, where randomly selected tips for more obscure flags 
would be interesting. 

For the latter, you could have an option to "show all tips for darcs 
record?" This could function as a form of extended online help. 

The tips system might also do some deep linking to further docs in the 
manual or wiki.

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title: if there are a lot of changes in a file, offer to record all? -> if there are a lot of changes in a file, offer to record all? (add a "tips" system?)

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Darcs bug tracker <bugs at darcs.net>
<http://bugs.darcs.net/issue2224>
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