further thoughts

1 files changed, 10 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/doc/todo/git_annex_grep.mdwn b/doc/todo/git_annex_grep.mdwn
index 783654a78..8cff25e9b 100644
--- a/doc/todo/git_annex_grep.mdwn
+++ b/doc/todo/git_annex_grep.mdwn
@@ -7,3 +7,13 @@ inability to quickly grep locally present files
 run "git annex grep"
 
 > i don't understand this request. just running `grep` will grep all the locally present files: sure there will be warnings, but you can use `2>/dev/null` to silence those. as for the suggested solution in comment, that greps for the filenames. please clarify the feature request here or this is [[invalid|done]]. --[[anarcat]]
+
+>> The reason `git grep` exists is partly speed (git objects can
+>> sometimes be read more efficiently than traversing the fileststem),
+>> and partly the ability to grep a whole tree of source code, but
+>> avoid grepping build artifacts, etc. The former reason doesn't apply
+>> with git-annex. The latter reason applies somewhat, but it's much less
+>> common to want to grep large binary files than it is to want to grep a
+>> source tree. `git annex find` can be fed to `grep` when one wants to do
+>> that. So I don't see a compelling case to add this to git-annex.
+>> --[[Joey]]