1gitcli(7) 2========= 3 4NAME 5---- 6gitcli - Git command line interface and conventions 7 8SYNOPSIS 9-------- 10gitcli 11 12 13DESCRIPTION 14----------- 15 16This manual describes the convention used throughout Git CLI. 17 18Many commands take revisions (most often "commits", but sometimes 19"tree-ish", depending on the context and command) and paths as their 20arguments. Here are the rules: 21 22 * Revisions come first and then paths. 23 E.g. in `git diff v1.0 v2.0 arch/x86 include/asm-x86`, 24 `v1.0` and `v2.0` are revisions and `arch/x86` and `include/asm-x86` 25 are paths. 26 27 * When an argument can be misunderstood as either a revision or a path, 28 they can be disambiguated by placing `--` between them. 29 E.g. `git diff -- HEAD` is, "I have a file called HEAD in my work 30 tree. Please show changes between the version I staged in the index 31 and what I have in the work tree for that file". not "show difference 32 between the HEAD commit and the work tree as a whole". You can say 33 `git diff HEAD --` to ask for the latter. 34 35 * Without disambiguating `--`, Git makes a reasonable guess, but errors 36 out and asking you to disambiguate when ambiguous. E.g. if you have a 37 file called HEAD in your work tree, `git diff HEAD` is ambiguous, and 38 you have to say either `git diff HEAD --` or `git diff -- HEAD` to 39 disambiguate. 40+ 41When writing a script that is expected to handle random user-input, it is 42a good practice to make it explicit which arguments are which by placing 43disambiguating `--` at appropriate places. 44 45 * Many commands allow wildcards in paths, but you need to protect 46 them from getting globbed by the shell. These two mean different 47 things: 48+ 49-------------------------------- 50$ git checkout -- *.c 51$ git checkout -- \*.c 52-------------------------------- 53+ 54The former lets your shell expand the fileglob, and you are asking 55the dot-C files in your working tree to be overwritten with the version 56in the index. The latter passes the `*.c` to Git, and you are asking 57the paths in the index that match the pattern to be checked out to your 58working tree. After running `git add hello.c; rm hello.c`, you will _not_ 59see `hello.c` in your working tree with the former, but with the latter 60you will. 61 62Here are the rules regarding the "flags" that you should follow when you are 63scripting Git: 64 65 * it's preferred to use the non dashed form of Git commands, which means that 66 you should prefer `git foo` to `git-foo`. 67 68 * splitting short options to separate words (prefer `git foo -a -b` 69 to `git foo -ab`, the latter may not even work). 70 71 * when a command line option takes an argument, use the 'sticked' form. In 72 other words, write `git foo -oArg` instead of `git foo -o Arg` for short 73 options, and `git foo --long-opt=Arg` instead of `git foo --long-opt Arg` 74 for long options. An option that takes optional option-argument must be 75 written in the 'sticked' form. 76 77 * when you give a revision parameter to a command, make sure the parameter is 78 not ambiguous with a name of a file in the work tree. E.g. do not write 79 `git log -1 HEAD` but write `git log -1 HEAD --`; the former will not work 80 if you happen to have a file called `HEAD` in the work tree. 81 82 * many commands allow a long option "--option" to be abbreviated 83 only to their unique prefix (e.g. if there is no other option 84 whose name begins with "opt", you may be able to spell "--opt" to 85 invoke the "--option" flag), but you should fully spell them out 86 when writing your scripts; later versions of Git may introduce a 87 new option whose name shares the same prefix, e.g. "--optimize", 88 to make a short prefix that used to be unique no longer unique. 89 90 91ENHANCED OPTION PARSER 92---------------------- 93From the Git 1.5.4 series and further, many Git commands (not all of them at the 94time of the writing though) come with an enhanced option parser. 95 96Here is a list of the facilities provided by this option parser. 97 98 99Magic Options 100~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 101Commands which have the enhanced option parser activated all understand a 102couple of magic command line options: 103 104-h:: 105 gives a pretty printed usage of the command. 106+ 107--------------------------------------------- 108$ git describe -h 109usage: git describe [options] <committish>* 110 111 --contains find the tag that comes after the commit 112 --debug debug search strategy on stderr 113 --all use any ref in .git/refs 114 --tags use any tag in .git/refs/tags 115 --abbrev [<n>] use <n> digits to display SHA-1s 116 --candidates <n> consider <n> most recent tags (default: 10) 117--------------------------------------------- 118 119--help-all:: 120 Some Git commands take options that are only used for plumbing or that 121 are deprecated, and such options are hidden from the default usage. This 122 option gives the full list of options. 123 124 125Negating options 126~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 127Options with long option names can be negated by prefixing `--no-`. For 128example, `git branch` has the option `--track` which is 'on' by default. You 129can use `--no-track` to override that behaviour. The same goes for `--color` 130and `--no-color`. 131 132 133Aggregating short options 134~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 135Commands that support the enhanced option parser allow you to aggregate short 136options. This means that you can for example use `git rm -rf` or 137`git clean -fdx`. 138 139 140Abbreviating long options 141~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 142Commands that support the enhanced option parser accepts unique 143prefix of a long option as if it is fully spelled out, but use this 144with a caution. For example, `git commit --amen` behaves as if you 145typed `git commit --amend`, but that is true only until a later version 146of Git introduces another option that shares the same prefix, 147e.g `git commit --amenity" option. 148 149 150Separating argument from the option 151~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 152You can write the mandatory option parameter to an option as a separate 153word on the command line. That means that all the following uses work: 154 155---------------------------- 156$ git foo --long-opt=Arg 157$ git foo --long-opt Arg 158$ git foo -oArg 159$ git foo -o Arg 160---------------------------- 161 162However, this is *NOT* allowed for switches with an optional value, where the 163'sticked' form must be used: 164---------------------------- 165$ git describe --abbrev HEAD # correct 166$ git describe --abbrev=10 HEAD # correct 167$ git describe --abbrev 10 HEAD # NOT WHAT YOU MEANT 168---------------------------- 169 170 171NOTES ON FREQUENTLY CONFUSED OPTIONS 172------------------------------------ 173 174Many commands that can work on files in the working tree 175and/or in the index can take `--cached` and/or `--index` 176options. Sometimes people incorrectly think that, because 177the index was originally called cache, these two are 178synonyms. They are *not* -- these two options mean very 179different things. 180 181 * The `--cached` option is used to ask a command that 182 usually works on files in the working tree to *only* work 183 with the index. For example, `git grep`, when used 184 without a commit to specify from which commit to look for 185 strings in, usually works on files in the working tree, 186 but with the `--cached` option, it looks for strings in 187 the index. 188 189 * The `--index` option is used to ask a command that 190 usually works on files in the working tree to *also* 191 affect the index. For example, `git stash apply` usually 192 merges changes recorded in a stash to the working tree, 193 but with the `--index` option, it also merges changes to 194 the index as well. 195 196`git apply` command can be used with `--cached` and 197`--index` (but not at the same time). Usually the command 198only affects the files in the working tree, but with 199`--index`, it patches both the files and their index 200entries, and with `--cached`, it modifies only the index 201entries. 202 203See also http://marc.info/?l=git&m=116563135620359 and 204http://marc.info/?l=git&m=119150393620273 for further 205information. 206 207GIT 208--- 209Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite