We currently have two parallel notation for dealing with object types
in the code: a string and a numerical value.  One of them is obviously
redundent, and the most used one requires more stack space and a bunch
of strcmp() all over the place.

This is an initial step for the removal of the version using a char array
found in object reading code paths.  The patch is unfortunately large but
there is no sane way to split it in smaller parts without breaking the
system.

Signed-off-by: Nicolas Pitre <nico@cam.org>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net>