Documentation / git-show-ref.txton commit Merge branch 'cc/maint-1.6.0-bisect-fix' (0c34735)
   1git-show-ref(1)
   2===============
   3
   4NAME
   5----
   6git-show-ref - List references in a local repository
   7
   8SYNOPSIS
   9--------
  10[verse]
  11'git show-ref' [-q|--quiet] [--verify] [-h|--head] [-d|--dereference]
  12             [-s|--hash] [--abbrev] [--tags] [--heads] [--] <pattern>...
  13'git show-ref' --exclude-existing[=pattern]
  14
  15DESCRIPTION
  16-----------
  17
  18Displays references available in a local repository along with the associated
  19commit IDs. Results can be filtered using a pattern and tags can be
  20dereferenced into object IDs. Additionally, it can be used to test whether a
  21particular ref exists.
  22
  23The --exclude-existing form is a filter that does the inverse, it shows the
  24refs from stdin that don't exist in the local repository.
  25
  26Use of this utility is encouraged in favor of directly accessing files under
  27in the `.git` directory.
  28
  29OPTIONS
  30-------
  31
  32-h::
  33--head::
  34
  35        Show the HEAD reference.
  36
  37--tags::
  38--heads::
  39
  40        Limit to only "refs/heads" and "refs/tags", respectively.  These
  41        options are not mutually exclusive; when given both, references stored
  42        in "refs/heads" and "refs/tags" are displayed.
  43
  44-d::
  45--dereference::
  46
  47        Dereference tags into object IDs as well. They will be shown with "^{}"
  48        appended.
  49
  50-s::
  51--hash::
  52
  53        Only show the SHA1 hash, not the reference name. When also using
  54        --dereference the dereferenced tag will still be shown after the SHA1.
  55
  56--verify::
  57
  58        Enable stricter reference checking by requiring an exact ref path.
  59        Aside from returning an error code of 1, it will also print an error
  60        message if '--quiet' was not specified.
  61
  62--abbrev::
  63--abbrev=len::
  64
  65        Abbreviate the object name.  When using `--hash`, you do
  66        not have to say `--hash --abbrev`; `--hash=len` would do.
  67
  68-q::
  69--quiet::
  70
  71        Do not print any results to stdout. When combined with '--verify' this
  72        can be used to silently check if a reference exists.
  73
  74--exclude-existing::
  75--exclude-existing=pattern::
  76
  77        Make 'git-show-ref' act as a filter that reads refs from stdin of the
  78        form "^(?:<anything>\s)?<refname>(?:\^\{\})?$" and performs the
  79        following actions on each:
  80        (1) strip "^{}" at the end of line if any;
  81        (2) ignore if pattern is provided and does not head-match refname;
  82        (3) warn if refname is not a well-formed refname and skip;
  83        (4) ignore if refname is a ref that exists in the local repository;
  84        (5) otherwise output the line.
  85
  86
  87<pattern>...::
  88
  89        Show references matching one or more patterns.
  90
  91OUTPUT
  92------
  93
  94The output is in the format: '<SHA-1 ID>' '<space>' '<reference name>'.
  95
  96-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  97$ git show-ref --head --dereference
  98832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 HEAD
  99832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 refs/heads/master
 100832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 refs/heads/origin
 1013521017556c5de4159da4615a39fa4d5d2c279b5 refs/tags/v0.99.9c
 1026ddc0964034342519a87fe013781abf31c6db6ad refs/tags/v0.99.9c^{}
 103055e4ae3ae6eb344cbabf2a5256a49ea66040131 refs/tags/v1.0rc4
 104423325a2d24638ddcc82ce47be5e40be550f4507 refs/tags/v1.0rc4^{}
 105...
 106-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 107
 108When using --hash (and not --dereference) the output format is: '<SHA-1 ID>'
 109
 110-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 111$ git show-ref --heads --hash
 1122e3ba0114a1f52b47df29743d6915d056be13278
 113185008ae97960c8d551adcd9e23565194651b5d1
 11403adf42c988195b50e1a1935ba5fcbc39b2b029b
 115...
 116-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 117
 118EXAMPLE
 119-------
 120
 121To show all references called "master", whether tags or heads or anything
 122else, and regardless of how deep in the reference naming hierarchy they are,
 123use:
 124
 125-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 126        git show-ref master
 127-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 128
 129This will show "refs/heads/master" but also "refs/remote/other-repo/master",
 130if such references exists.
 131
 132When using the '--verify' flag, the command requires an exact path:
 133
 134-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 135        git show-ref --verify refs/heads/master
 136-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 137
 138will only match the exact branch called "master".
 139
 140If nothing matches, 'git-show-ref' will return an error code of 1,
 141and in the case of verification, it will show an error message.
 142
 143For scripting, you can ask it to be quiet with the "--quiet" flag, which
 144allows you to do things like
 145
 146-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 147        git show-ref --quiet --verify -- "refs/heads/$headname" ||
 148                echo "$headname is not a valid branch"
 149-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 150
 151to check whether a particular branch exists or not (notice how we don't
 152actually want to show any results, and we want to use the full refname for it
 153in order to not trigger the problem with ambiguous partial matches).
 154
 155To show only tags, or only proper branch heads, use "--tags" and/or "--heads"
 156respectively (using both means that it shows tags and heads, but not other
 157random references under the refs/ subdirectory).
 158
 159To do automatic tag object dereferencing, use the "-d" or "--dereference"
 160flag, so you can do
 161
 162-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 163        git show-ref --tags --dereference
 164-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 165
 166to get a listing of all tags together with what they dereference.
 167
 168SEE ALSO
 169--------
 170linkgit:git-ls-remote[1]
 171
 172AUTHORS
 173-------
 174Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>.
 175Man page by Jonas Fonseca <fonseca@diku.dk>.
 176
 177GIT
 178---
 179Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite