Documentation / git-show-ref.txton commit Merge branch 'maint' (26192be)
   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[=<n>]] [--abbrev[=<n>]] [--tags]
  13             [--heads] [--] <pattern>...
  14'git show-ref' --exclude-existing[=<pattern>] < ref-list
  15
  16DESCRIPTION
  17-----------
  18
  19Displays references available in a local repository along with the associated
  20commit IDs. Results can be filtered using a pattern and tags can be
  21dereferenced into object IDs. Additionally, it can be used to test whether a
  22particular ref exists.
  23
  24The --exclude-existing form is a filter that does the inverse, it shows the
  25refs from stdin that don't exist in the local repository.
  26
  27Use of this utility is encouraged in favor of directly accessing files under
  28the `.git` directory.
  29
  30OPTIONS
  31-------
  32
  33-h::
  34--head::
  35
  36        Show the HEAD reference.
  37
  38--tags::
  39--heads::
  40
  41        Limit to only "refs/heads" and "refs/tags", respectively.  These
  42        options are not mutually exclusive; when given both, references stored
  43        in "refs/heads" and "refs/tags" are displayed.
  44
  45-d::
  46--dereference::
  47
  48        Dereference tags into object IDs as well. They will be shown with "^{}"
  49        appended.
  50
  51-s::
  52--hash[=<n>]::
  53
  54        Only show the SHA1 hash, not the reference name. When combined with
  55        --dereference the dereferenced tag will still be shown after the SHA1.
  56
  57--verify::
  58
  59        Enable stricter reference checking by requiring an exact ref path.
  60        Aside from returning an error code of 1, it will also print an error
  61        message if '--quiet' was not specified.
  62
  63--abbrev[=<n>]::
  64
  65        Abbreviate the object name.  When using `--hash`, you do
  66        not have to say `--hash --abbrev`; `--hash=n` 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[=<pattern>]::
  75
  76        Make 'git-show-ref' act as a filter that reads refs from stdin of the
  77        form "^(?:<anything>\s)?<refname>(?:\^\{\})?$" and performs the
  78        following actions on each:
  79        (1) strip "^{}" at the end of line if any;
  80        (2) ignore if pattern is provided and does not head-match refname;
  81        (3) warn if refname is not a well-formed refname and skip;
  82        (4) ignore if refname is a ref that exists in the local repository;
  83        (5) otherwise output the line.
  84
  85
  86<pattern>...::
  87
  88        Show references matching one or more patterns.
  89
  90OUTPUT
  91------
  92
  93The output is in the format: '<SHA-1 ID>' '<space>' '<reference name>'.
  94
  95-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  96$ git show-ref --head --dereference
  97832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 HEAD
  98832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 refs/heads/master
  99832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 refs/heads/origin
 1003521017556c5de4159da4615a39fa4d5d2c279b5 refs/tags/v0.99.9c
 1016ddc0964034342519a87fe013781abf31c6db6ad refs/tags/v0.99.9c^{}
 102055e4ae3ae6eb344cbabf2a5256a49ea66040131 refs/tags/v1.0rc4
 103423325a2d24638ddcc82ce47be5e40be550f4507 refs/tags/v1.0rc4^{}
 104...
 105-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 106
 107When using --hash (and not --dereference) the output format is: '<SHA-1 ID>'
 108
 109-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 110$ git show-ref --heads --hash
 1112e3ba0114a1f52b47df29743d6915d056be13278
 112185008ae97960c8d551adcd9e23565194651b5d1
 11303adf42c988195b50e1a1935ba5fcbc39b2b029b
 114...
 115-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 116
 117EXAMPLE
 118-------
 119
 120To show all references called "master", whether tags or heads or anything
 121else, and regardless of how deep in the reference naming hierarchy they are,
 122use:
 123
 124-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 125        git show-ref master
 126-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 127
 128This will show "refs/heads/master" but also "refs/remote/other-repo/master",
 129if such references exists.
 130
 131When using the '--verify' flag, the command requires an exact path:
 132
 133-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 134        git show-ref --verify refs/heads/master
 135-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 136
 137will only match the exact branch called "master".
 138
 139If nothing matches, 'git-show-ref' will return an error code of 1,
 140and in the case of verification, it will show an error message.
 141
 142For scripting, you can ask it to be quiet with the "--quiet" flag, which
 143allows you to do things like
 144
 145-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 146        git show-ref --quiet --verify -- "refs/heads/$headname" ||
 147                echo "$headname is not a valid branch"
 148-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 149
 150to check whether a particular branch exists or not (notice how we don't
 151actually want to show any results, and we want to use the full refname for it
 152in order to not trigger the problem with ambiguous partial matches).
 153
 154To show only tags, or only proper branch heads, use "--tags" and/or "--heads"
 155respectively (using both means that it shows tags and heads, but not other
 156random references under the refs/ subdirectory).
 157
 158To do automatic tag object dereferencing, use the "-d" or "--dereference"
 159flag, so you can do
 160
 161-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 162        git show-ref --tags --dereference
 163-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 164
 165to get a listing of all tags together with what they dereference.
 166
 167SEE ALSO
 168--------
 169linkgit:git-ls-remote[1]
 170
 171AUTHORS
 172-------
 173Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>.
 174Man page by Jonas Fonseca <fonseca@diku.dk>.
 175
 176GIT
 177---
 178Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite