update-ref: add support for 'symref-delete' command

Add a new command 'symref-delete' to allow deletions of symbolic refs in
a transaction via the '--stdin' mode of the 'git-update-ref' command.
The 'symref-delete' command can, when given an <old-target>, delete the
provided <ref> only when it points to <old-target>.

This command is only compatible with the 'no-deref' mode because we
optionally want to check the 'old_target' of the ref being deleted.
De-referencing a symbolic ref would provide a regular ref and we already
have the 'delete' command for regular refs.

While users can also use 'git symbolic-ref -d' to delete symbolic refs,
the 'symref-delete' command in 'git-update-ref' allows users to do so
within a transaction, which promises atomicity of the operation and can
be batched with other commands.

When no 'old_target' is provided it can also delete regular refs,
similar to how the 'delete' command can delete symrefs when no 'old_oid'
is provided.

Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Karthik Nayak <karthik.188@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

1 files changed, 3 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/refs.h b/refs.h
index 48cec1ba72..5b84958528 100644
--- a/refs.h
+++ b/refs.h
@@ -767,7 +767,9 @@ int ref_transaction_create(struct ref_transaction *transaction,
 int ref_transaction_delete(struct ref_transaction *transaction,
 			   const char *refname,
 			   const struct object_id *old_oid,
-			   unsigned int flags, const char *msg,
+			   const char *old_target,
+			   unsigned int flags,
+			   const char *msg,
 			   struct strbuf *err);
 
 /*