[gregmac]

Your fictional example is not a good comparison -- I just can't imagine the scenario where you need to explain to someone who doesn't know how to modify their path why they need to add something to it.

For someone actually using git (and the CLI, at that) I'd expect to be able to say "oh, make sure git is in your path" and for them to understand how to check and set that, or at least be able to Google it and follow the instructions themselves. Likewise I'd ask something like "Can you cherry pick just that bug fix into a new PR so we can merge and deploy it today?", not give them a series of git CLI commands to paste in.

My observation of git beginners is ones using CLI say things like "oh, I screwed up my repo and had to clone a new copy". Good GUIs don't easily cause this situation, and mostly let you see and fix what happens when you do some weird accidental merge or rebase or someone else has force-pushed.

[rablackburn]

> I just can't imagine the scenario where you need to explain to someone who doesn't know how to modify their path why they need to add something to it.

Sounds like someone hasn’t had to train fresh graduate engineers for awhile ;)

[penteract]

Insufficient explanation about about how to add something to PATH (specifically the tools for compiling java) meant that I started programming 2 years later than I would have otherwise.

[winwhiz]

Yeah, I think I conflated a git specific question from the GP and a more general CLI question, my bad.

The argument can be made the interfacing with git is bad whether with mouse or with keyboard. My git secret weapon is to ask myself how do I make git do this thing that is easy in Subversion or Fossil and then I do that thing and I write it down so I can do it again in X number of months.