1git-format-patch(1) 2=================== 3 4NAME 5---- 6git-format-patch - Prepare patches for e-mail submission 7 8 9SYNOPSIS 10-------- 11[verse] 12'git format-patch' [-k] [(-o|--output-directory) <dir> | --stdout] 13 [--no-thread | --thread[=<style>]] 14 [(--attach|--inline)[=<boundary>] | --no-attach] 15 [-s | --signoff] 16 [--signature=<signature> | --no-signature] 17 [--signature-file=<file>] 18 [-n | --numbered | -N | --no-numbered] 19 [--start-number <n>] [--numbered-files] 20 [--in-reply-to=Message-Id] [--suffix=.<sfx>] 21 [--ignore-if-in-upstream] 22 [--rfc] [--subject-prefix=Subject-Prefix] 23 [(--reroll-count|-v) <n>] 24 [--to=<email>] [--cc=<email>] 25 [--[no-]cover-letter] [--quiet] [--notes[=<ref>]] 26 [--interdiff=<previous>] 27 [--progress] 28 [<common diff options>] 29 [ <since> | <revision range> ] 30 31DESCRIPTION 32----------- 33 34Prepare each commit with its patch in 35one file per commit, formatted to resemble UNIX mailbox format. 36The output of this command is convenient for e-mail submission or 37for use with 'git am'. 38 39There are two ways to specify which commits to operate on. 40 411. A single commit, <since>, specifies that the commits leading 42 to the tip of the current branch that are not in the history 43 that leads to the <since> to be output. 44 452. Generic <revision range> expression (see "SPECIFYING 46 REVISIONS" section in linkgit:gitrevisions[7]) means the 47 commits in the specified range. 48 49The first rule takes precedence in the case of a single <commit>. To 50apply the second rule, i.e., format everything since the beginning of 51history up until <commit>, use the `--root` option: `git format-patch 52--root <commit>`. If you want to format only <commit> itself, you 53can do this with `git format-patch -1 <commit>`. 54 55By default, each output file is numbered sequentially from 1, and uses the 56first line of the commit message (massaged for pathname safety) as 57the filename. With the `--numbered-files` option, the output file names 58will only be numbers, without the first line of the commit appended. 59The names of the output files are printed to standard 60output, unless the `--stdout` option is specified. 61 62If `-o` is specified, output files are created in <dir>. Otherwise 63they are created in the current working directory. The default path 64can be set with the `format.outputDirectory` configuration option. 65The `-o` option takes precedence over `format.outputDirectory`. 66To store patches in the current working directory even when 67`format.outputDirectory` points elsewhere, use `-o .`. 68 69By default, the subject of a single patch is "[PATCH] " followed by 70the concatenation of lines from the commit message up to the first blank 71line (see the DISCUSSION section of linkgit:git-commit[1]). 72 73When multiple patches are output, the subject prefix will instead be 74"[PATCH n/m] ". To force 1/1 to be added for a single patch, use `-n`. 75To omit patch numbers from the subject, use `-N`. 76 77If given `--thread`, `git-format-patch` will generate `In-Reply-To` and 78`References` headers to make the second and subsequent patch mails appear 79as replies to the first mail; this also generates a `Message-Id` header to 80reference. 81 82OPTIONS 83------- 84:git-format-patch: 1 85include::diff-options.txt[] 86 87-<n>:: 88 Prepare patches from the topmost <n> commits. 89 90-o <dir>:: 91--output-directory <dir>:: 92 Use <dir> to store the resulting files, instead of the 93 current working directory. 94 95-n:: 96--numbered:: 97 Name output in '[PATCH n/m]' format, even with a single patch. 98 99-N:: 100--no-numbered:: 101 Name output in '[PATCH]' format. 102 103--start-number <n>:: 104 Start numbering the patches at <n> instead of 1. 105 106--numbered-files:: 107 Output file names will be a simple number sequence 108 without the default first line of the commit appended. 109 110-k:: 111--keep-subject:: 112 Do not strip/add '[PATCH]' from the first line of the 113 commit log message. 114 115-s:: 116--signoff:: 117 Add `Signed-off-by:` line to the commit message, using 118 the committer identity of yourself. 119 See the signoff option in linkgit:git-commit[1] for more information. 120 121--stdout:: 122 Print all commits to the standard output in mbox format, 123 instead of creating a file for each one. 124 125--attach[=<boundary>]:: 126 Create multipart/mixed attachment, the first part of 127 which is the commit message and the patch itself in the 128 second part, with `Content-Disposition: attachment`. 129 130--no-attach:: 131 Disable the creation of an attachment, overriding the 132 configuration setting. 133 134--inline[=<boundary>]:: 135 Create multipart/mixed attachment, the first part of 136 which is the commit message and the patch itself in the 137 second part, with `Content-Disposition: inline`. 138 139--thread[=<style>]:: 140--no-thread:: 141 Controls addition of `In-Reply-To` and `References` headers to 142 make the second and subsequent mails appear as replies to the 143 first. Also controls generation of the `Message-Id` header to 144 reference. 145+ 146The optional <style> argument can be either `shallow` or `deep`. 147'shallow' threading makes every mail a reply to the head of the 148series, where the head is chosen from the cover letter, the 149`--in-reply-to`, and the first patch mail, in this order. 'deep' 150threading makes every mail a reply to the previous one. 151+ 152The default is `--no-thread`, unless the `format.thread` configuration 153is set. If `--thread` is specified without a style, it defaults to the 154style specified by `format.thread` if any, or else `shallow`. 155+ 156Beware that the default for 'git send-email' is to thread emails 157itself. If you want `git format-patch` to take care of threading, you 158will want to ensure that threading is disabled for `git send-email`. 159 160--in-reply-to=Message-Id:: 161 Make the first mail (or all the mails with `--no-thread`) appear as a 162 reply to the given Message-Id, which avoids breaking threads to 163 provide a new patch series. 164 165--ignore-if-in-upstream:: 166 Do not include a patch that matches a commit in 167 <until>..<since>. This will examine all patches reachable 168 from <since> but not from <until> and compare them with the 169 patches being generated, and any patch that matches is 170 ignored. 171 172--subject-prefix=<Subject-Prefix>:: 173 Instead of the standard '[PATCH]' prefix in the subject 174 line, instead use '[<Subject-Prefix>]'. This 175 allows for useful naming of a patch series, and can be 176 combined with the `--numbered` option. 177 178--rfc:: 179 Alias for `--subject-prefix="RFC PATCH"`. RFC means "Request For 180 Comments"; use this when sending an experimental patch for 181 discussion rather than application. 182 183-v <n>:: 184--reroll-count=<n>:: 185 Mark the series as the <n>-th iteration of the topic. The 186 output filenames have `v<n>` prepended to them, and the 187 subject prefix ("PATCH" by default, but configurable via the 188 `--subject-prefix` option) has ` v<n>` appended to it. E.g. 189 `--reroll-count=4` may produce `v4-0001-add-makefile.patch` 190 file that has "Subject: [PATCH v4 1/20] Add makefile" in it. 191 192--to=<email>:: 193 Add a `To:` header to the email headers. This is in addition 194 to any configured headers, and may be used multiple times. 195 The negated form `--no-to` discards all `To:` headers added so 196 far (from config or command line). 197 198--cc=<email>:: 199 Add a `Cc:` header to the email headers. This is in addition 200 to any configured headers, and may be used multiple times. 201 The negated form `--no-cc` discards all `Cc:` headers added so 202 far (from config or command line). 203 204--from:: 205--from=<ident>:: 206 Use `ident` in the `From:` header of each commit email. If the 207 author ident of the commit is not textually identical to the 208 provided `ident`, place a `From:` header in the body of the 209 message with the original author. If no `ident` is given, use 210 the committer ident. 211+ 212Note that this option is only useful if you are actually sending the 213emails and want to identify yourself as the sender, but retain the 214original author (and `git am` will correctly pick up the in-body 215header). Note also that `git send-email` already handles this 216transformation for you, and this option should not be used if you are 217feeding the result to `git send-email`. 218 219--add-header=<header>:: 220 Add an arbitrary header to the email headers. This is in addition 221 to any configured headers, and may be used multiple times. 222 For example, `--add-header="Organization: git-foo"`. 223 The negated form `--no-add-header` discards *all* (`To:`, 224 `Cc:`, and custom) headers added so far from config or command 225 line. 226 227--[no-]cover-letter:: 228 In addition to the patches, generate a cover letter file 229 containing the branch description, shortlog and the overall diffstat. You can 230 fill in a description in the file before sending it out. 231 232--interdiff=<previous>:: 233 As a reviewer aid, insert an interdiff into the cover letter showing 234 the differences between the previous version of the patch series and 235 the series currently being formatted. `previous` is a single revision 236 naming the tip of the previous series which shares a common base with 237 the series being formatted (for example `git format-patch 238 --cover-letter --interdiff=feature/v1 -3 feature/v2`). 239 240--notes[=<ref>]:: 241 Append the notes (see linkgit:git-notes[1]) for the commit 242 after the three-dash line. 243+ 244The expected use case of this is to write supporting explanation for 245the commit that does not belong to the commit log message proper, 246and include it with the patch submission. While one can simply write 247these explanations after `format-patch` has run but before sending, 248keeping them as Git notes allows them to be maintained between versions 249of the patch series (but see the discussion of the `notes.rewrite` 250configuration options in linkgit:git-notes[1] to use this workflow). 251 252--[no-]signature=<signature>:: 253 Add a signature to each message produced. Per RFC 3676 the signature 254 is separated from the body by a line with '-- ' on it. If the 255 signature option is omitted the signature defaults to the Git version 256 number. 257 258--signature-file=<file>:: 259 Works just like --signature except the signature is read from a file. 260 261--suffix=.<sfx>:: 262 Instead of using `.patch` as the suffix for generated 263 filenames, use specified suffix. A common alternative is 264 `--suffix=.txt`. Leaving this empty will remove the `.patch` 265 suffix. 266+ 267Note that the leading character does not have to be a dot; for example, 268you can use `--suffix=-patch` to get `0001-description-of-my-change-patch`. 269 270-q:: 271--quiet:: 272 Do not print the names of the generated files to standard output. 273 274--no-binary:: 275 Do not output contents of changes in binary files, instead 276 display a notice that those files changed. Patches generated 277 using this option cannot be applied properly, but they are 278 still useful for code review. 279 280--zero-commit:: 281 Output an all-zero hash in each patch's From header instead 282 of the hash of the commit. 283 284--base=<commit>:: 285 Record the base tree information to identify the state the 286 patch series applies to. See the BASE TREE INFORMATION section 287 below for details. 288 289--root:: 290 Treat the revision argument as a <revision range>, even if it 291 is just a single commit (that would normally be treated as a 292 <since>). Note that root commits included in the specified 293 range are always formatted as creation patches, independently 294 of this flag. 295 296--progress:: 297 Show progress reports on stderr as patches are generated. 298 299CONFIGURATION 300------------- 301You can specify extra mail header lines to be added to each message, 302defaults for the subject prefix and file suffix, number patches when 303outputting more than one patch, add "To" or "Cc:" headers, configure 304attachments, and sign off patches with configuration variables. 305 306------------ 307[format] 308 headers = "Organization: git-foo\n" 309 subjectPrefix = CHANGE 310 suffix = .txt 311 numbered = auto 312 to = <email> 313 cc = <email> 314 attach [ = mime-boundary-string ] 315 signOff = true 316 coverletter = auto 317------------ 318 319 320DISCUSSION 321---------- 322 323The patch produced by 'git format-patch' is in UNIX mailbox format, 324with a fixed "magic" time stamp to indicate that the file is output 325from format-patch rather than a real mailbox, like so: 326 327------------ 328From 8f72bad1baf19a53459661343e21d6491c3908d3 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 329From: Tony Luck <tony.luck@intel.com> 330Date: Tue, 13 Jul 2010 11:42:54 -0700 331Subject: [PATCH] =?UTF-8?q?[IA64]=20Put=20ia64=20config=20files=20on=20the=20?= 332 =?UTF-8?q?Uwe=20Kleine-K=C3=B6nig=20diet?= 333MIME-Version: 1.0 334Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 335Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit 336 337arch/arm config files were slimmed down using a python script 338(See commit c2330e286f68f1c408b4aa6515ba49d57f05beae comment) 339 340Do the same for ia64 so we can have sleek & trim looking 341... 342------------ 343 344Typically it will be placed in a MUA's drafts folder, edited to add 345timely commentary that should not go in the changelog after the three 346dashes, and then sent as a message whose body, in our example, starts 347with "arch/arm config files were...". On the receiving end, readers 348can save interesting patches in a UNIX mailbox and apply them with 349linkgit:git-am[1]. 350 351When a patch is part of an ongoing discussion, the patch generated by 352'git format-patch' can be tweaked to take advantage of the 'git am 353--scissors' feature. After your response to the discussion comes a 354line that consists solely of "`-- >8 --`" (scissors and perforation), 355followed by the patch with unnecessary header fields removed: 356 357------------ 358... 359> So we should do such-and-such. 360 361Makes sense to me. How about this patch? 362 363-- >8 -- 364Subject: [IA64] Put ia64 config files on the Uwe Kleine-König diet 365 366arch/arm config files were slimmed down using a python script 367... 368------------ 369 370When sending a patch this way, most often you are sending your own 371patch, so in addition to the "`From $SHA1 $magic_timestamp`" marker you 372should omit `From:` and `Date:` lines from the patch file. The patch 373title is likely to be different from the subject of the discussion the 374patch is in response to, so it is likely that you would want to keep 375the Subject: line, like the example above. 376 377Checking for patch corruption 378~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 379Many mailers if not set up properly will corrupt whitespace. Here are 380two common types of corruption: 381 382* Empty context lines that do not have _any_ whitespace. 383 384* Non-empty context lines that have one extra whitespace at the 385 beginning. 386 387One way to test if your MUA is set up correctly is: 388 389* Send the patch to yourself, exactly the way you would, except 390 with To: and Cc: lines that do not contain the list and 391 maintainer address. 392 393* Save that patch to a file in UNIX mailbox format. Call it a.patch, 394 say. 395 396* Apply it: 397 398 $ git fetch <project> master:test-apply 399 $ git checkout test-apply 400 $ git reset --hard 401 $ git am a.patch 402 403If it does not apply correctly, there can be various reasons. 404 405* The patch itself does not apply cleanly. That is _bad_ but 406 does not have much to do with your MUA. You might want to rebase 407 the patch with linkgit:git-rebase[1] before regenerating it in 408 this case. 409 410* The MUA corrupted your patch; "am" would complain that 411 the patch does not apply. Look in the .git/rebase-apply/ subdirectory and 412 see what 'patch' file contains and check for the common 413 corruption patterns mentioned above. 414 415* While at it, check the 'info' and 'final-commit' files as well. 416 If what is in 'final-commit' is not exactly what you would want to 417 see in the commit log message, it is very likely that the 418 receiver would end up hand editing the log message when applying 419 your patch. Things like "Hi, this is my first patch.\n" in the 420 patch e-mail should come after the three-dash line that signals 421 the end of the commit message. 422 423MUA-SPECIFIC HINTS 424------------------ 425Here are some hints on how to successfully submit patches inline using 426various mailers. 427 428GMail 429~~~~~ 430GMail does not have any way to turn off line wrapping in the web 431interface, so it will mangle any emails that you send. You can however 432use "git send-email" and send your patches through the GMail SMTP server, or 433use any IMAP email client to connect to the google IMAP server and forward 434the emails through that. 435 436For hints on using 'git send-email' to send your patches through the 437GMail SMTP server, see the EXAMPLE section of linkgit:git-send-email[1]. 438 439For hints on submission using the IMAP interface, see the EXAMPLE 440section of linkgit:git-imap-send[1]. 441 442Thunderbird 443~~~~~~~~~~~ 444By default, Thunderbird will both wrap emails as well as flag 445them as being 'format=flowed', both of which will make the 446resulting email unusable by Git. 447 448There are three different approaches: use an add-on to turn off line wraps, 449configure Thunderbird to not mangle patches, or use 450an external editor to keep Thunderbird from mangling the patches. 451 452Approach #1 (add-on) 453^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 454 455Install the Toggle Word Wrap add-on that is available from 456https://addons.mozilla.org/thunderbird/addon/toggle-word-wrap/ 457It adds a menu entry "Enable Word Wrap" in the composer's "Options" menu 458that you can tick off. Now you can compose the message as you otherwise do 459(cut + paste, 'git format-patch' | 'git imap-send', etc), but you have to 460insert line breaks manually in any text that you type. 461 462Approach #2 (configuration) 463^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 464Three steps: 465 4661. Configure your mail server composition as plain text: 467 Edit...Account Settings...Composition & Addressing, 468 uncheck "Compose Messages in HTML". 469 4702. Configure your general composition window to not wrap. 471+ 472In Thunderbird 2: 473Edit..Preferences..Composition, wrap plain text messages at 0 474+ 475In Thunderbird 3: 476Edit..Preferences..Advanced..Config Editor. Search for 477"mail.wrap_long_lines". 478Toggle it to make sure it is set to `false`. Also, search for 479"mailnews.wraplength" and set the value to 0. 480 4813. Disable the use of format=flowed: 482Edit..Preferences..Advanced..Config Editor. Search for 483"mailnews.send_plaintext_flowed". 484Toggle it to make sure it is set to `false`. 485 486After that is done, you should be able to compose email as you 487otherwise would (cut + paste, 'git format-patch' | 'git imap-send', etc), 488and the patches will not be mangled. 489 490Approach #3 (external editor) 491^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 492 493The following Thunderbird extensions are needed: 494AboutConfig from http://aboutconfig.mozdev.org/ and 495External Editor from http://globs.org/articles.php?lng=en&pg=8 496 4971. Prepare the patch as a text file using your method of choice. 498 4992. Before opening a compose window, use Edit->Account Settings to 500 uncheck the "Compose messages in HTML format" setting in the 501 "Composition & Addressing" panel of the account to be used to 502 send the patch. 503 5043. In the main Thunderbird window, 'before' you open the compose 505 window for the patch, use Tools->about:config to set the 506 following to the indicated values: 507+ 508---------- 509 mailnews.send_plaintext_flowed => false 510 mailnews.wraplength => 0 511---------- 512 5134. Open a compose window and click the external editor icon. 514 5155. In the external editor window, read in the patch file and exit 516 the editor normally. 517 518Side note: it may be possible to do step 2 with 519about:config and the following settings but no one's tried yet. 520 521---------- 522 mail.html_compose => false 523 mail.identity.default.compose_html => false 524 mail.identity.id?.compose_html => false 525---------- 526 527There is a script in contrib/thunderbird-patch-inline which can help 528you include patches with Thunderbird in an easy way. To use it, do the 529steps above and then use the script as the external editor. 530 531KMail 532~~~~~ 533This should help you to submit patches inline using KMail. 534 5351. Prepare the patch as a text file. 536 5372. Click on New Mail. 538 5393. Go under "Options" in the Composer window and be sure that 540 "Word wrap" is not set. 541 5424. Use Message -> Insert file... and insert the patch. 543 5445. Back in the compose window: add whatever other text you wish to the 545 message, complete the addressing and subject fields, and press send. 546 547BASE TREE INFORMATION 548--------------------- 549 550The base tree information block is used for maintainers or third party 551testers to know the exact state the patch series applies to. It consists 552of the 'base commit', which is a well-known commit that is part of the 553stable part of the project history everybody else works off of, and zero 554or more 'prerequisite patches', which are well-known patches in flight 555that is not yet part of the 'base commit' that need to be applied on top 556of 'base commit' in topological order before the patches can be applied. 557 558The 'base commit' is shown as "base-commit: " followed by the 40-hex of 559the commit object name. A 'prerequisite patch' is shown as 560"prerequisite-patch-id: " followed by the 40-hex 'patch id', which can 561be obtained by passing the patch through the `git patch-id --stable` 562command. 563 564Imagine that on top of the public commit P, you applied well-known 565patches X, Y and Z from somebody else, and then built your three-patch 566series A, B, C, the history would be like: 567 568................................................ 569---P---X---Y---Z---A---B---C 570................................................ 571 572With `git format-patch --base=P -3 C` (or variants thereof, e.g. with 573`--cover-letter` or using `Z..C` instead of `-3 C` to specify the 574range), the base tree information block is shown at the end of the 575first message the command outputs (either the first patch, or the 576cover letter), like this: 577 578------------ 579base-commit: P 580prerequisite-patch-id: X 581prerequisite-patch-id: Y 582prerequisite-patch-id: Z 583------------ 584 585For non-linear topology, such as 586 587................................................ 588---P---X---A---M---C 589 \ / 590 Y---Z---B 591................................................ 592 593You can also use `git format-patch --base=P -3 C` to generate patches 594for A, B and C, and the identifiers for P, X, Y, Z are appended at the 595end of the first message. 596 597If set `--base=auto` in cmdline, it will track base commit automatically, 598the base commit will be the merge base of tip commit of the remote-tracking 599branch and revision-range specified in cmdline. 600For a local branch, you need to track a remote branch by `git branch 601--set-upstream-to` before using this option. 602 603EXAMPLES 604-------- 605 606* Extract commits between revisions R1 and R2, and apply them on top of 607the current branch using 'git am' to cherry-pick them: 608+ 609------------ 610$ git format-patch -k --stdout R1..R2 | git am -3 -k 611------------ 612 613* Extract all commits which are in the current branch but not in the 614origin branch: 615+ 616------------ 617$ git format-patch origin 618------------ 619+ 620For each commit a separate file is created in the current directory. 621 622* Extract all commits that lead to 'origin' since the inception of the 623project: 624+ 625------------ 626$ git format-patch --root origin 627------------ 628 629* The same as the previous one: 630+ 631------------ 632$ git format-patch -M -B origin 633------------ 634+ 635Additionally, it detects and handles renames and complete rewrites 636intelligently to produce a renaming patch. A renaming patch reduces 637the amount of text output, and generally makes it easier to review. 638Note that non-Git "patch" programs won't understand renaming patches, so 639use it only when you know the recipient uses Git to apply your patch. 640 641* Extract three topmost commits from the current branch and format them 642as e-mailable patches: 643+ 644------------ 645$ git format-patch -3 646------------ 647 648SEE ALSO 649-------- 650linkgit:git-am[1], linkgit:git-send-email[1] 651 652GIT 653--- 654Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite