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Allow specifying at runtime which POSIX shell to use #3301

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@dscho dscho commented Jul 1, 2021

We already have the SHELL_PATH variable, but that is a build-time setting.

In Git for Windows' context, that is not good enough: we want to use the very same Git artifacts both in the regular MinGit flavor as well as in the BusyBox one.

So let's introduce support for the config setting core.shell, which is interpreted as the absolute path of the POSIX-compliant shell to use to execute hooks, scripted Git commands, complex aliases, etc.

We also set the environment variable SHELL if core.shell was configured. This helps the scenario where OpenSSH is called in a BusyBox variant of MinGit (which comes without any MSYS2 shell): OpenSSH looks at that variable to run commands such as ones specified via the ProxyCommand setting in the SSH config.

Note: in the BusyBox variant of MinGit, we will want to set this in the system config, to a path relative to the runtime prefix. For that reason, we will need to address gitgitgadget#66 rather sooner than later, before going through with this here PR.

dscho added 2 commits July 2, 2021 12:30
Right now, the compiled-in default is used always, which can be
overridden at compile time via the `SHELL_PATH` variable.

However, in Git for Windows' context, there is a scenario where this is
not good enough: the BusyBox flavor of MinGit wants to use BusyBox'
`ash` instead.

To allow for that, let's introduce a new config variable: `core.shell`.
Its value is expected to be the absolute path to a valid, working POSIX
shell. This shell will be then used by `git.exe` whenever it needs to
execute something via shell, such as moderately complex aliases.

And it is not only Git that is expected to use that `ash`, it is also
OpenSSH (e.g. when running any configured `ProxyCommand`): programs
spawned from `git.exe` may need to run a shell and look at the
environment variable `SHELL` for that. Therefore, let's set that, too.

Signed-off-by: Johannes Schindelin <[email protected]>
On Windows, we have to emulate that Linux/Unix/macOS feature where a
file starting with a `#!` line and being marked as executable is run as
a script through the interpreter specified by said `#!` line.

Traditionally, we ignore the actual path specified in that line because
it will be a Unix-style path anyway, something that `git.exe` is not
even supposed to understand. We then go on to look up the actual path of
the interpreter by iterating over the components in the environment
variable `PATH`.

Let's special-case `sh` in that scenario when the config setting
`core.shell` exists: in this case, we want to use it instead.

This allows us to configure BusyBox' `ash` to be used for all of the
shell scripting needs of the BusyBox flavor of MinGit.

While at it, assume that any shell configured via `core.shell` is _not_
an MSYS2 shell, i.e. that we should use regular Win32 command-line
quoting, not MSYS2/Cygwin one.

Signed-off-by: Johannes Schindelin <[email protected]>
fizietechD

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3 participants