terminology confusion: bookmark vs named head

[Stephen Lee]

On Thu, Dec 19, 2013 at 11:09 AM, Matt Mackall <mpm at selenic.com> wrote
> Your learning for today: "hg up" != "hg up <any identifier>"
>
> (The update command is basically two commands in one, a choice we made
> about a decade ago by looking at the way CVS and SVN work. No point
> complaining about it, as its now about a decade too late to change.)
>

I hope I don't sound like I'm complaining - this is something I would
like to fix or at least improve.
I am more than happy to do it myself, the problem is I can't think of
a good enough solution.

> The former tries to figure out if there's an unambiguous place to move
> forward to and then goes to it, moving any current bookmark.
>
> The latter JUMPS to the specified revision regardless of whether it's
> forward or backward in history, on a different branch, or whatever. If
> it's a bookmark, it activates it.
>

I do understand the conceptual difference between these two usages of update.
What I am looking for is an alternate spelling to get the first
behaviour when the place to move to *is* ambiguous and I need to
specify it.

Steve