These four patches remove or modify parts of messages that I always found
more annoying than helpful. I am not screening them yet, but if nobody
complains in, say, 2 weeks I will.

4 patches for repository http://darcs.net/screened:

patch da98f6eae4bc3c158e1edb47f300289d01a12d2a
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Sat Sep 29 18:42:18 CEST 2018
  * re-formulate the bad sources hint
  
  First, it no longer shouts at the user. Second, instead of saying what the
  user "should probably" do, we give a clear recommendation, but make it
  conditional on circumstance (the user may want to keep the source if they
  plan to restore access to it).

patch f293190d6c4527a331ff682a9281ab28a348be3e
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Sat Sep 29 22:16:18 CEST 2018
  * remove hint "Do you have the right URI for the repository?"
  
  This hint serves no purpose at all. We already told the user the name of the
  repo and that we don't recognize it as one. What more is there to say?

patch d3dd6e750d102108c77188cb7d4a64a89e59d557
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Sat Sep 29 22:03:30 CEST 2018
  * remove the set-default hint
  
  This hint was probably added when we changed the default for push and pull
  to --no-set-default, so that users could get used to the new behavior. This
  has been many years ago and the hint nowadays looks rather strange and just
  causes confusion for newcomers or casual users. A by-product of this change
  is that the code for handling --set-default gets a lot simpler.

patch ab9d625c0ce86cca33282bc336416d1ef893cf5a
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Fri Oct  5 01:39:19 CEST 2018
  * remove the "darcs failed:" from error messages
  
  Most error conditions reported by darcs are due to invalid input from the
  user, or indicate non-existence of things (patches, files, ...). It makes no
  sense for darcs to take the blame for that, which is what the phrase
  suggests to me.

Attachments

• patch-preview.txt
• re_formulate-the-bad-sources-hint.dpatch
• unnamed

2 patches for repository http://darcs.net/screened:

patch da98f6eae4bc3c158e1edb47f300289d01a12d2a
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Sat Sep 29 18:42:18 CEST 2018
  * re-formulate the bad sources hint
  
  First, it no longer shouts at the user. Second, instead of saying what the
  user "should probably" do, we give a clear recommendation, but make it
  conditional on circumstance (the user may want to keep the source if they
  plan to restore access to it).

patch 981ff9520737040d079e27d7bb23cb5af41f517e
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Fri Oct 19 00:49:32 CEST 2018
  * add missing space in new sources hint

Attachments

• patch-preview.txt
• re_formulate-the-bad-sources-hint.dpatch
• unnamed

No objections so far, will screen now.

Sorry, I didn't notice this in time to comment on whether they
should be screened or not :-)

>  * remove the set-default hint

I don't think this is just about the transition from the old
behaviour, but also to help new darcs users discover this useful
functionality.

>  * re-formulate the bad sources hint

Fine

>  * remove hint "Do you have the right URI for the repository?"

Fine

>  * remove the "darcs failed:" from error messages

Fine

>  * add missing space in new sources hint

Fine

>>  * remove the set-default hint
> 
> I don't think this is just about the transition from the old
> behaviour, but also to help new darcs users discover this useful
> functionality.

Granted. But honestly: there are /many/ useful commands and options and
even long time darcs users don't know all of them. How many do we want
to advertise unasked and to new-comers and experienced users alike?

I know Darcs users who never once considered hitting '?' to see what
other options there are when selecting patches, even though /each/ time
the prompt offers/suggests to do that.

What does that tell us about the set-default hint? At first it is
annoying, because it talks about something you aren't interested in
/just now/ because you just want to finish this piece of work and that
requires pushing your changes to xyz. If that happens two or three times
in a row, the message starts becoming noise that your brain filters out
as irrelevant. When you finally get into a situation where the hint
would help you, it is too late to have any positive effect. Because you
already /know/ it just contains useless noise and you /know/ that can't
help you solve any real problem. Right?

This is how humans work and this is the reality we must face when
designing a user interface. Every piece of information that is given out
of context and that is not immediately useful or at least strongly
related to the outcome of a command will be annoying noise and filtered out.

If we had the resources to back our hints up with a full featured AI
that learns what the user likes or likes not and e.g. automatically
stops printing hints after it sees it gets ignored more than 5 times in
a row, ... but we don't and even those AI backed adaptive new-comer
friendly gimmicks tend to become old pretty soon.

On 19/11/2018 02:42, Ben Franksen wrote:

> What does that tell us about the set-default hint? At first it is
> annoying, because it talks about something you aren't interested in
> /just now/ because you just want to finish this piece of work and that
> requires pushing your changes to xyz.

While I agree in general that suggestions that would require the user to
go off and do something completely different aren't all that helpful,
I think this one has two advantages:

- Acting on it is actually really easy cognitively as you just have to
do the same thing again but slightly differently:
q<enter>up<enter><space>--set-default<enter>

- The hint only appears when the repo is not already the default repo,
which means it actually conveys some useful information. It's
difficult for me to be sure about how I instinctively work, but
I think I actually make use of that information and sometimes
find it a useful reminder that I'm not interacting with "standard"
upstream.

> While I agree in general that suggestions that would require the user to
> go off and do something completely different aren't all that helpful,
> I think this one has two advantages:
> 
> - Acting on it is actually really easy cognitively as you just have to
> do the same thing again but slightly differently:
> q<enter>up<enter><space>--set-default<enter>
> 
> - The hint only appears when the repo is not already the default repo,
> which means it actually conveys some useful information. It's
> difficult for me to be sure about how I instinctively work, but
> I think I actually make use of that information and sometimes
> find it a useful reminder that I'm not interacting with "standard"
> upstream.

Hm. You really find the set-default hint useful. Interesting. I always
thought it was something we keep only because we /think/ it /might/ be
useful for others (mostly new-comers).

I will roll back this patch, perhaps slightly modifying the
wording/spelling to be less intrusive.

Please take a look at issue2610 which I just opened. It contains an
alternative solution to support my preferred work-flow.

2 patches for repository http://darcs.net/screened:

patch 24fcdac4a350e33db91470e2c762f1f0f9425040
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Mon Nov 19 18:49:53 CET 2018
  * rollback of "remove the set-default hint" (patch
d3dd6e750d102108c77188cb7d4a64a89e59d557)

patch a8a44e147336e0e818e5d1d3d629990219dda2af
Author: Ben Franksen <ben.franksen@online.de>
Date:   Mon Nov 19 19:19:13 CET 2018
  * re-formulate the set-default hint
  
  Besides being worded in a less patronizing way, the hint no longer
suggests
  to "quit now" unless the command being executed is interactive.

Attachments

• rollback-of-_remove-the-set_default-hint_-_patch-d3dd6e750d102108c77188cb7d4a64a89e59d557_.dpatch

Note, I have not yet screened the two follow-up patches.

I have screened the follow-up patches that re-enable the set-default
hint and only slightly change the wording.

Thanks! (rather belatedly, as with the rest of this batch of reviews..)