Documentation / git-add.txton commit Merge branch 'ma/mailing-list-address-in-git-help' (20f28d7)
   1git-add(1)
   2==========
   3
   4NAME
   5----
   6git-add - Add file contents to the index
   7
   8SYNOPSIS
   9--------
  10[verse]
  11'git add' [--verbose | -v] [--dry-run | -n] [--force | -f] [--interactive | -i] [--patch | -p]
  12          [--edit | -e] [--[no-]all | --[no-]ignore-removal | [--update | -u]]
  13          [--intent-to-add | -N] [--refresh] [--ignore-errors] [--ignore-missing] [--renormalize]
  14          [--chmod=(+|-)x] [--] [<pathspec>...]
  15
  16DESCRIPTION
  17-----------
  18This command updates the index using the current content found in
  19the working tree, to prepare the content staged for the next commit.
  20It typically adds the current content of existing paths as a whole,
  21but with some options it can also be used to add content with
  22only part of the changes made to the working tree files applied, or
  23remove paths that do not exist in the working tree anymore.
  24
  25The "index" holds a snapshot of the content of the working tree, and it
  26is this snapshot that is taken as the contents of the next commit.  Thus
  27after making any changes to the working tree, and before running
  28the commit command, you must use the `add` command to add any new or
  29modified files to the index.
  30
  31This command can be performed multiple times before a commit.  It only
  32adds the content of the specified file(s) at the time the add command is
  33run; if you want subsequent changes included in the next commit, then
  34you must run `git add` again to add the new content to the index.
  35
  36The `git status` command can be used to obtain a summary of which
  37files have changes that are staged for the next commit.
  38
  39The `git add` command will not add ignored files by default.  If any
  40ignored files were explicitly specified on the command line, `git add`
  41will fail with a list of ignored files.  Ignored files reached by
  42directory recursion or filename globbing performed by Git (quote your
  43globs before the shell) will be silently ignored.  The 'git add' command can
  44be used to add ignored files with the `-f` (force) option.
  45
  46Please see linkgit:git-commit[1] for alternative ways to add content to a
  47commit.
  48
  49
  50OPTIONS
  51-------
  52<pathspec>...::
  53        Files to add content from.  Fileglobs (e.g. `*.c`) can
  54        be given to add all matching files.  Also a
  55        leading directory name (e.g. `dir` to add `dir/file1`
  56        and `dir/file2`) can be given to update the index to
  57        match the current state of the directory as a whole (e.g.
  58        specifying `dir` will record not just a file `dir/file1`
  59        modified in the working tree, a file `dir/file2` added to
  60        the working tree, but also a file `dir/file3` removed from
  61        the working tree.  Note that older versions of Git used
  62        to ignore removed files; use `--no-all` option if you want
  63        to add modified or new files but ignore removed ones.
  64+
  65For more details about the <pathspec> syntax, see the 'pathspec' entry
  66in linkgit:gitglossary[7].
  67
  68-n::
  69--dry-run::
  70        Don't actually add the file(s), just show if they exist and/or will
  71        be ignored.
  72
  73-v::
  74--verbose::
  75        Be verbose.
  76
  77-f::
  78--force::
  79        Allow adding otherwise ignored files.
  80
  81-i::
  82--interactive::
  83        Add modified contents in the working tree interactively to
  84        the index. Optional path arguments may be supplied to limit
  85        operation to a subset of the working tree. See ``Interactive
  86        mode'' for details.
  87
  88-p::
  89--patch::
  90        Interactively choose hunks of patch between the index and the
  91        work tree and add them to the index. This gives the user a chance
  92        to review the difference before adding modified contents to the
  93        index.
  94+
  95This effectively runs `add --interactive`, but bypasses the
  96initial command menu and directly jumps to the `patch` subcommand.
  97See ``Interactive mode'' for details.
  98
  99-e::
 100--edit::
 101        Open the diff vs. the index in an editor and let the user
 102        edit it.  After the editor was closed, adjust the hunk headers
 103        and apply the patch to the index.
 104+
 105The intent of this option is to pick and choose lines of the patch to
 106apply, or even to modify the contents of lines to be staged. This can be
 107quicker and more flexible than using the interactive hunk selector.
 108However, it is easy to confuse oneself and create a patch that does not
 109apply to the index. See EDITING PATCHES below.
 110
 111-u::
 112--update::
 113        Update the index just where it already has an entry matching
 114        <pathspec>.  This removes as well as modifies index entries to
 115        match the working tree, but adds no new files.
 116+
 117If no <pathspec> is given when `-u` option is used, all
 118tracked files in the entire working tree are updated (old versions
 119of Git used to limit the update to the current directory and its
 120subdirectories).
 121
 122-A::
 123--all::
 124--no-ignore-removal::
 125        Update the index not only where the working tree has a file
 126        matching <pathspec> but also where the index already has an
 127        entry.  This adds, modifies, and removes index entries to
 128        match the working tree.
 129+
 130If no <pathspec> is given when `-A` option is used, all
 131files in the entire working tree are updated (old versions
 132of Git used to limit the update to the current directory and its
 133subdirectories).
 134
 135--no-all::
 136--ignore-removal::
 137        Update the index by adding new files that are unknown to the
 138        index and files modified in the working tree, but ignore
 139        files that have been removed from the working tree.  This
 140        option is a no-op when no <pathspec> is used.
 141+
 142This option is primarily to help users who are used to older
 143versions of Git, whose "git add <pathspec>..." was a synonym
 144for "git add --no-all <pathspec>...", i.e. ignored removed files.
 145
 146-N::
 147--intent-to-add::
 148        Record only the fact that the path will be added later. An entry
 149        for the path is placed in the index with no content. This is
 150        useful for, among other things, showing the unstaged content of
 151        such files with `git diff` and committing them with `git commit
 152        -a`.
 153
 154--refresh::
 155        Don't add the file(s), but only refresh their stat()
 156        information in the index.
 157
 158--ignore-errors::
 159        If some files could not be added because of errors indexing
 160        them, do not abort the operation, but continue adding the
 161        others. The command shall still exit with non-zero status.
 162        The configuration variable `add.ignoreErrors` can be set to
 163        true to make this the default behaviour.
 164
 165--ignore-missing::
 166        This option can only be used together with --dry-run. By using
 167        this option the user can check if any of the given files would
 168        be ignored, no matter if they are already present in the work
 169        tree or not.
 170
 171--no-warn-embedded-repo::
 172        By default, `git add` will warn when adding an embedded
 173        repository to the index without using `git submodule add` to
 174        create an entry in `.gitmodules`. This option will suppress the
 175        warning (e.g., if you are manually performing operations on
 176        submodules).
 177
 178--renormalize::
 179        Apply the "clean" process freshly to all tracked files to
 180        forcibly add them again to the index.  This is useful after
 181        changing `core.autocrlf` configuration or the `text` attribute
 182        in order to correct files added with wrong CRLF/LF line endings.
 183        This option implies `-u`.
 184
 185--chmod=(+|-)x::
 186        Override the executable bit of the added files.  The executable
 187        bit is only changed in the index, the files on disk are left
 188        unchanged.
 189
 190\--::
 191        This option can be used to separate command-line options from
 192        the list of files, (useful when filenames might be mistaken
 193        for command-line options).
 194
 195
 196CONFIGURATION
 197-------------
 198
 199The optional configuration variable `core.excludesFile` indicates a path to a
 200file containing patterns of file names to exclude from git-add, similar to
 201$GIT_DIR/info/exclude.  Patterns in the exclude file are used in addition to
 202those in info/exclude.  See linkgit:gitignore[5].
 203
 204
 205EXAMPLES
 206--------
 207
 208* Adds content from all `*.txt` files under `Documentation` directory
 209and its subdirectories:
 210+
 211------------
 212$ git add Documentation/\*.txt
 213------------
 214+
 215Note that the asterisk `*` is quoted from the shell in this
 216example; this lets the command include the files from
 217subdirectories of `Documentation/` directory.
 218
 219* Considers adding content from all git-*.sh scripts:
 220+
 221------------
 222$ git add git-*.sh
 223------------
 224+
 225Because this example lets the shell expand the asterisk (i.e. you are
 226listing the files explicitly), it does not consider
 227`subdir/git-foo.sh`.
 228
 229INTERACTIVE MODE
 230----------------
 231When the command enters the interactive mode, it shows the
 232output of the 'status' subcommand, and then goes into its
 233interactive command loop.
 234
 235The command loop shows the list of subcommands available, and
 236gives a prompt "What now> ".  In general, when the prompt ends
 237with a single '>', you can pick only one of the choices given
 238and type return, like this:
 239
 240------------
 241    *** Commands ***
 242      1: status       2: update       3: revert       4: add untracked
 243      5: patch        6: diff         7: quit         8: help
 244    What now> 1
 245------------
 246
 247You also could say `s` or `sta` or `status` above as long as the
 248choice is unique.
 249
 250The main command loop has 6 subcommands (plus help and quit).
 251
 252status::
 253
 254   This shows the change between HEAD and index (i.e. what will be
 255   committed if you say `git commit`), and between index and
 256   working tree files (i.e. what you could stage further before
 257   `git commit` using `git add`) for each path.  A sample output
 258   looks like this:
 259+
 260------------
 261              staged     unstaged path
 262     1:       binary      nothing foo.png
 263     2:     +403/-35        +1/-1 git-add--interactive.perl
 264------------
 265+
 266It shows that foo.png has differences from HEAD (but that is
 267binary so line count cannot be shown) and there is no
 268difference between indexed copy and the working tree
 269version (if the working tree version were also different,
 270'binary' would have been shown in place of 'nothing').  The
 271other file, git-add{litdd}interactive.perl, has 403 lines added
 272and 35 lines deleted if you commit what is in the index, but
 273working tree file has further modifications (one addition and
 274one deletion).
 275
 276update::
 277
 278   This shows the status information and issues an "Update>>"
 279   prompt.  When the prompt ends with double '>>', you can
 280   make more than one selection, concatenated with whitespace or
 281   comma.  Also you can say ranges.  E.g. "2-5 7,9" to choose
 282   2,3,4,5,7,9 from the list.  If the second number in a range is
 283   omitted, all remaining patches are taken.  E.g. "7-" to choose
 284   7,8,9 from the list.  You can say '*' to choose everything.
 285+
 286What you chose are then highlighted with '*',
 287like this:
 288+
 289------------
 290           staged     unstaged path
 291  1:       binary      nothing foo.png
 292* 2:     +403/-35        +1/-1 git-add--interactive.perl
 293------------
 294+
 295To remove selection, prefix the input with `-`
 296like this:
 297+
 298------------
 299Update>> -2
 300------------
 301+
 302After making the selection, answer with an empty line to stage the
 303contents of working tree files for selected paths in the index.
 304
 305revert::
 306
 307  This has a very similar UI to 'update', and the staged
 308  information for selected paths are reverted to that of the
 309  HEAD version.  Reverting new paths makes them untracked.
 310
 311add untracked::
 312
 313  This has a very similar UI to 'update' and
 314  'revert', and lets you add untracked paths to the index.
 315
 316patch::
 317
 318  This lets you choose one path out of a 'status' like selection.
 319  After choosing the path, it presents the diff between the index
 320  and the working tree file and asks you if you want to stage
 321  the change of each hunk.  You can select one of the following
 322  options and type return:
 323
 324       y - stage this hunk
 325       n - do not stage this hunk
 326       q - quit; do not stage this hunk or any of the remaining ones
 327       a - stage this hunk and all later hunks in the file
 328       d - do not stage this hunk or any of the later hunks in the file
 329       g - select a hunk to go to
 330       / - search for a hunk matching the given regex
 331       j - leave this hunk undecided, see next undecided hunk
 332       J - leave this hunk undecided, see next hunk
 333       k - leave this hunk undecided, see previous undecided hunk
 334       K - leave this hunk undecided, see previous hunk
 335       s - split the current hunk into smaller hunks
 336       e - manually edit the current hunk
 337       ? - print help
 338+
 339After deciding the fate for all hunks, if there is any hunk
 340that was chosen, the index is updated with the selected hunks.
 341+
 342You can omit having to type return here, by setting the configuration
 343variable `interactive.singleKey` to `true`.
 344
 345diff::
 346
 347  This lets you review what will be committed (i.e. between
 348  HEAD and index).
 349
 350
 351EDITING PATCHES
 352---------------
 353
 354Invoking `git add -e` or selecting `e` from the interactive hunk
 355selector will open a patch in your editor; after the editor exits, the
 356result is applied to the index. You are free to make arbitrary changes
 357to the patch, but note that some changes may have confusing results, or
 358even result in a patch that cannot be applied.  If you want to abort the
 359operation entirely (i.e., stage nothing new in the index), simply delete
 360all lines of the patch. The list below describes some common things you
 361may see in a patch, and which editing operations make sense on them.
 362
 363--
 364added content::
 365
 366Added content is represented by lines beginning with "{plus}". You can
 367prevent staging any addition lines by deleting them.
 368
 369removed content::
 370
 371Removed content is represented by lines beginning with "-". You can
 372prevent staging their removal by converting the "-" to a " " (space).
 373
 374modified content::
 375
 376Modified content is represented by "-" lines (removing the old content)
 377followed by "{plus}" lines (adding the replacement content). You can
 378prevent staging the modification by converting "-" lines to " ", and
 379removing "{plus}" lines. Beware that modifying only half of the pair is
 380likely to introduce confusing changes to the index.
 381--
 382
 383There are also more complex operations that can be performed. But beware
 384that because the patch is applied only to the index and not the working
 385tree, the working tree will appear to "undo" the change in the index.
 386For example, introducing a new line into the index that is in neither
 387the HEAD nor the working tree will stage the new line for commit, but
 388the line will appear to be reverted in the working tree.
 389
 390Avoid using these constructs, or do so with extreme caution.
 391
 392--
 393removing untouched content::
 394
 395Content which does not differ between the index and working tree may be
 396shown on context lines, beginning with a " " (space).  You can stage
 397context lines for removal by converting the space to a "-". The
 398resulting working tree file will appear to re-add the content.
 399
 400modifying existing content::
 401
 402One can also modify context lines by staging them for removal (by
 403converting " " to "-") and adding a "{plus}" line with the new content.
 404Similarly, one can modify "{plus}" lines for existing additions or
 405modifications. In all cases, the new modification will appear reverted
 406in the working tree.
 407
 408new content::
 409
 410You may also add new content that does not exist in the patch; simply
 411add new lines, each starting with "{plus}". The addition will appear
 412reverted in the working tree.
 413--
 414
 415There are also several operations which should be avoided entirely, as
 416they will make the patch impossible to apply:
 417
 418* adding context (" ") or removal ("-") lines
 419* deleting context or removal lines
 420* modifying the contents of context or removal lines
 421
 422SEE ALSO
 423--------
 424linkgit:git-status[1]
 425linkgit:git-rm[1]
 426linkgit:git-reset[1]
 427linkgit:git-mv[1]
 428linkgit:git-commit[1]
 429linkgit:git-update-index[1]
 430
 431GIT
 432---
 433Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite