view mercurial/help/filesets.txt @ 25596:c1975809a6b5

templater: take any string literals as template, but not for rawstring (BC)

This patch series is intended to unify the interpretation of string literals.
It is breaking change that boldly assumes

 a. string literal "..." never contains template-like fragment or it is
    intended to be a template
 b. we tend to use raw string literal r"..." for regexp pattern in which "{"
    should have different meaning

Currently, we don't have a comprehensible rule how string literals are
evaluated in template functions. For example, fill() takes "initialindent"
and "hangindent" as templates, but not for "text", whereas "text" is a
template in pad() function.

  date(date, fmt)
  diff(includepattern, excludepattern)
  fill(text, width, initialident: T, hangindent: T)
  get(dict, key)
  if(expr, then: T, else: T)
  ifcontains(search, thing, then: T, else: T)
  ifeq(expr1, expr2, then: T, else: T)
  indent(text, indentchars, firstline)
  join(list, sep)
  label(label: T, expr: T)
  pad(text: T, width, fillchar, right)
  revset(query, formatargs...])
  rstdoc(text, style)
  shortest(node, minlength)
  startswith(pattern, text)
  strip(text, chars)
  sub(pattern, replacement, expression: T)
  word(number, text, separator)
  expr % template: T

  T: interpret "string" or r"rawstring" as template

This patch series adjusts the rule as follows:

 a. string literal, '' or "", starts template processing (BC)
 b. raw string literal, r'' or r"", disables both \-escape and template
    processing (BC, done by subsequent patches)
 c. fragment not surrounded by {} is non-templated string

  "ccc{'aaa'}{r'bbb'}"
   ------------------  *: template
   ---                 c: string
        ---            a: template
                ---    b: rawstring

Because this can eliminate the compilation of template arguments from the
evaluation phase, "hg log -Tdefault" gets faster.

  % cd mozilla-central
  % LANG=C HGRCPATH=/dev/null hg log -Tdefault -r0:10000 --time > /dev/null
  before: real 4.870 secs (user 4.860+0.000 sys 0.010+0.000)
  after:  real 3.480 secs (user 3.440+0.000 sys 0.030+0.000)

Also, this will allow us to parse nested templates at once for better error
indication.

Mercurial supports a functional language for selecting a set of
files.

Like other file patterns, this pattern type is indicated by a prefix,
'set:'. The language supports a number of predicates which are joined
by infix operators. Parenthesis can be used for grouping.

Identifiers such as filenames or patterns must be quoted with single
or double quotes if they contain characters outside of
``[.*{}[]?/\_a-zA-Z0-9\x80-\xff]`` or if they match one of the
predefined predicates. This generally applies to file patterns other
than globs and arguments for predicates.

Special characters can be used in quoted identifiers by escaping them,
e.g., ``\n`` is interpreted as a newline. To prevent them from being
interpreted, strings can be prefixed with ``r``, e.g. ``r'...'``.

There is a single prefix operator:

``not x``
  Files not in x. Short form is ``! x``.

These are the supported infix operators:

``x and y``
  The intersection of files in x and y. Short form is ``x & y``.

``x or y``
  The union of files in x and y. There are two alternative short
  forms: ``x | y`` and ``x + y``.

``x - y``
  Files in x but not in y.

The following predicates are supported:

.. predicatesmarker

Some sample queries:

- Show status of files that appear to be binary in the working directory::

    hg status -A "set:binary()"

- Forget files that are in .hgignore but are already tracked::

    hg forget "set:hgignore() and not ignored()"

- Find text files that contain a string::

    hg files "set:grep(magic) and not binary()"

- Find C files in a non-standard encoding::

    hg files "set:**.c and not encoding('UTF-8')"

- Revert copies of large binary files::

    hg revert "set:copied() and binary() and size('>1M')"

- Remove files listed in foo.lst that contain the letter a or b::

    hg remove "set: 'listfile:foo.lst' and (**a* or **b*)"

See also :hg:`help patterns`.