It’s most natural for nouns to be explicit because they are things, and it is most natural for verbs to implied by what is done with those things: moving them around. The post was just a vcs rosetta stone not anything that would need to be memorized because copying (synchronizing) something to something else is rather intuitive.
pijul [-w] [branch | filepath] [branch | filepath]
This ui amounts to using pijul like the unix cp command for “files” and “directories”. What it adds over cp is “branches” as a new kind of noun that can capture changes from nouns, namely file(s)/directorie(s)/branch(es) and -w for write vs query (dryrun).
The vocabulary necessary for using dvcs repos should be much less than it is. Without a lot of familiar false dichotomies I’d expect new users from other dvcs to be at least briefly surprised at how much they don’t need for doing all the same things in a declarative ui. I wouldn’t expect that response from total newcomers to dvcs.
Maybe I’ll implement this as an alternate or experimental ui that others and myself can test drive.