Re: [PATCH 3/5] cli/count: add --output=modifications

[David Bremner <david@tethera.net>]

Tomi Ollila <tomi.ollila@iki.fi> writes:

> Currently, `notmuch count` outputs lines that contain just one integer;
> this changes this by introducing output with uuid ([0-9a-f-]) and integer
> delimited by tab character.
>
> To put it lightly, this looks "inconsistent" and don't please my aesthetic
> eye.
>
> One option (being it worse or better) could be that by default only
> lastmod value is printed and with separate option it is prefixed with
> database UUID (in every --output option).

Can you think of any use case for the uuid with the other count outputs?
It feels pretty artificial to me.

Another option is to make a "notmuch metadata" command. I'm not really
sure about the syntax, but perhaps a uuid option makes more sense
there, so e.g.

       notmuch metadata --with-uuid lastmod

I'm pretty convinced that we need report uuid and lastmod together (at
least optionally). I'm less sure we need a full get/set interface for
metadata, since people with that use case could use xapian-metadata.