git-add --intent-to-add (-N)

This adds "--intent-to-add" option to "git add".  This is to let the
system know that you will tell it the final contents to be staged later,
iow, just be aware of the presense of the path with the type of the blob
for now.  It is implemented by staging an empty blob as the content.

With this sequence:

    $ git reset --hard
    $ edit newfile
    $ git add -N newfile
    $ edit newfile oldfile
    $ git diff

the diff will show all changes relative to the current commit.  Then you
can do:

    $ git commit -a ;# commit everything

or

    $ git commit oldfile ;# only oldfile, newfile not yet added

to pretend you are working with an index-free system like CVS.

Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

1 files changed, 3 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/builtin-add.c b/builtin-add.c
index 7c874e311..ea4e77169 100644
--- a/builtin-add.c
+++ b/builtin-add.c
@@ -166,7 +166,7 @@ static const char ignore_error[] =
 "The following paths are ignored by one of your .gitignore files:\n";
 
 static int verbose = 0, show_only = 0, ignored_too = 0, refresh_only = 0;
-static int ignore_add_errors, addremove;
+static int ignore_add_errors, addremove, intent_to_add;
 
 static struct option builtin_add_options[] = {
 	OPT__DRY_RUN(&show_only),
@@ -176,6 +176,7 @@ static struct option builtin_add_options[] = {
 	OPT_BOOLEAN('p', "patch", &patch_interactive, "interactive patching"),
 	OPT_BOOLEAN('f', "force", &ignored_too, "allow adding otherwise ignored files"),
 	OPT_BOOLEAN('u', "update", &take_worktree_changes, "update tracked files"),
+	OPT_BOOLEAN('N', "intent-to-add", &intent_to_add, "record only the fact that the path will be added later"),
 	OPT_BOOLEAN('A', "all", &addremove, "add all, noticing removal of tracked files"),
 	OPT_BOOLEAN( 0 , "refresh", &refresh_only, "don't add, only refresh the index"),
 	OPT_BOOLEAN( 0 , "ignore-errors", &ignore_add_errors, "just skip files which cannot be added because of errors"),
@@ -246,6 +247,7 @@ int cmd_add(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
 
 	flags = ((verbose ? ADD_CACHE_VERBOSE : 0) |
 		 (show_only ? ADD_CACHE_PRETEND : 0) |
+		 (intent_to_add ? ADD_CACHE_INTENT : 0) |
 		 (ignore_add_errors ? ADD_CACHE_IGNORE_ERRORS : 0) |
 		 (!(addremove || take_worktree_changes)
 		  ? ADD_CACHE_IGNORE_REMOVAL : 0));