Description
By default, Mercurial is very minimal:
- When you commit, it enters the commit under your username, not your real name. (So, for example, it would have me committing as “prh” instead of “Peter Hosey”.)
- Many useful commands, such as “record” and “email”, are not available.
- Mercurial does not save passwords to the Keychain.
- Diffs use the unified diff format, not the more-capable git-style format.
- You can't convert repositories from other VCSs to Mercurial.
You can solve all of these problems easily by simply setting up a .hgrc file. However, setting all these things up yourself is a lot of busy work. You could do most of it with copy and paste, but there are some things that you need to fill in yourself (such as your name), and that makes for a long set of instructions.
configure-hgrc automates the busy work. It asks you the questions that you need to answer, and creates a .hgrc file in your home directory with your answers filled in and all the most useful plug-ins turned on.
NOTE: Even with the hgkeychain extension, Mercurial does not save your SMTP password to the Keychain; configure-hgrc puts it in your ~/.hgrc file. Be careful with where else you put that file. Alternatively, you may wish to leave the password empty and simply enter your password every time you mail a patch.
