Setup overwrites global (user) setting for core.editor on update

[schtandard]

• I was not able to find an open or closed issue matching what I'm seeing

Setup

• Which version of Git for Windows are you using? Is it 32-bit or 64-bit?

  $ git --version --build-options
  git version 2.31.1.windows.1
  cpu: x86_64
  built from commit: c5f0be26a7e3846e3b6268d1c6c4800d838c6bbb
  sizeof-long: 4
  sizeof-size_t: 8
  shell-path: /bin/sh
  feature: fsmonitor--daemon
  

• Which version of Windows are you running? Vista, 7, 8, 10? Is it 32-bit or 64-bit?

  $ cmd.exe /c ver
  
  Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19042.868]
  

• What options did you set as part of the installation? Or did you choose the
  defaults?

  $ cat /etc/install-options.txt
  
  Editor Option: Atom
  Custom Editor Path:
  Default Branch Option:
  Path Option: Cmd
  SSH Option: OpenSSH
  Tortoise Option: false
  CURL Option: OpenSSL
  CRLF Option: CRLFAlways
  Bash Terminal Option: MinTTY
  Git Pull Behavior Option: Merge
  Use Credential Manager: Core
  Performance Tweaks FSCache: Enabled
  Enable Symlinks: Disabled
  Enable Pseudo Console Support: Disabled
  

• Any other interesting things about your environment that might be related
  to the issue you're seeing?

  Nope.

Details

• Which terminal/shell are you running Git from? e.g Bash/CMD/PowerShell/other

  Bash.

• What's the problem?

  Due to an issue with Atom, I have to reconfigure core.editor, which I did using

  git config --global core.editor "atom --wait --new-window"

  which is then reflected in the corresponding %UserProfile%\.gitconfig file as

  [core]
    editor = atom --wait --new-window

  However, whenever I update Git for Windows, this is reverted to

  [core]
    editor = \"C:\\Users\\wilde\\appdata\\Local\\atom\\app-1.55.0\\atom.exe\" --wait

  and I have to reconfigure it anew.

  I would have expected the installer to only change the system level settings, not the global ones. This is also indicated by this comment to Windows Setup » 'Choose the default editor used by Git': two small but useful suggestions #2818. (An implementation to that feature request would also provide a way to get around this problem, but still this seems to be unintended behavior, which is why I am reporting it separately.)

[dscho]

@schtandard since you require custom options, I don't think you can use this:

Editor Option: Atom
Custom Editor Path:

But why not configure this as a custom editor? You already have the absolute path, and can then also specify the editor options.

I would have expected the installer to only change the system level settings, not the global ones.

Git for Windows will only configure editors in the system config which are installed system-wide. But Atom only comes in a user-wide flavor, therefore Git for Windows configures it in the user-wide config.

[schtandard]

Git for Windows will only configure editors in the system config which are installed system-wide. But Atom only comes in a user-wide flavor, therefore Git for Windows configures it in the user-wide config.

Ah, that makes sense.

But why not configure this as a custom editor? You already have the absolute path, and can then also specify the editor options.

That works, thanks. However, I did find another issue in the process (#3155).