Comment by viraptor
1 year ago
None of those problems are unsolvable. The basic idea is: your terminal and script can get two different outputs. Git can already do that with colours, so it can also use more verbose for basic commands.
The other part is - scripts can use longer options while the console commands should be optimised for typing.
This has nothing to do with understanding the model or model itself. Complex things can have good interfaces - those just require good interface design and git did not get much of that.
You already answered your own question. There's plenty of terminals that don't support colors. Plenty that don't support 16 bit colors. Do a grep into a curl and you'll find some fun shenanigans.
You're right. This has to do with you thinking your usecase is the best or most common.
As stated before, there is no average user[0]. So the intent is that you have the command that can be built upon. Is everyone unhappy with the base command? Probably. But is is always easier to build up than to tear down.
[0] Again, linux servers and linux embedded devices significantly out number users. Each of them do. So even if there were an average user, guess what, it wouldn't be you.
> There's plenty of terminals that don't support colors.
Colour support is irrelevant to this case. They can check isatty() and give different output depending on that.
And verbose information is better in average case, if it's well formatted. Unless you're flooding the screen with useless data of course, but that's not what's being talked about here.
Let's be real, how often do you see this?
Honestly, no. I hate this. I spend far more time filtering output than trying to generate more. I'm glad I have the option to generate more, because sometimes the needle isn't in the haystack. But usually more verbose output just means adding more hay.
Again, it is really easy to add more output and this is actually an easier problem than the reverse. FATAL ERROR WARN INFO DEBUG TRACE log levels have been around for awhile and they've been working really well.
I'll let you in on something. If you're frequently having to reach for verbose outputs, there's probably a better tool. That is, unless if it is personal preference. Which in that case, alias is for you. I have to reiterate, the "average case" and "average user" does not exist. This argument will not get you anywhere because you're talking about a unicorn. No matter how much you think they exist, they don't. It is only average within a more specific subdomain. It might appear average to you because you work with those types of people and are part of those communities, but someone else from a different community will have very different viewpoints. So it is very intentional that things are not designed for "the average" because there is none.