The Git staging area doesn't have to be this complicated. A re-branding away from index to staging area would go a long way. Adding an alias from git diff --sta

The Git staging area doesn't have to be this complicated. A re-branding away from index to staging area would go a long way. Adding an alias from git diff --staged to git diff --cached and removing references to the cache from common user commands would make a lot of sense and reduce end-user confusion. --staged is already an alias for --cached in the latest Git version.