It's only this time around that I've read the sad conclusion to this thread, from the original contributor
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/57643...
> Unfortunately, I haven't had any time inte the last few days to code, nor read mail. I'm assuming that there is no point in me finishing the patch and that git will go with the strbuf solution? /Lukas
... with no response.