hg heads command inconsistant?

[Johan Samyn]

2010/1/8 Alexander Schatten <ml_alexanderschatten at gmx.at>:
>> >  hg ci --close-branch -m "closing message"
>>
>> Closing branches works only on named branches.
>>
> Hm, this does not make so much sense *to me*; plus the help says otherwise:
>  --close-branch  mark a branch as closed, hiding it from the branch list
>
As the branch list (as in 'hg branches') only shows named branches, it
is then quite logical that --close-branch can only close/hide named
branches too. The more because it does not accept any arguments (like
a branch head rev or so) to identify a branch to close, other than
implicitly the currently active branch you are performing the commit
for.
Also note that nothing keeps you from committing again to the 'closed'
branch. The option only hides the name when using the 'hg branches'
command. And then only if you don't use the --closed option.
You're not the first to have had higher expectations from that option
than it really offers (count me in ;-) ). But consider it useful to
people who have a local working repo where many (small) branches are
born and die (= are 'closed') regularly. It helps to keep the 'hg
branches' output focus on what still matters.
Johan