Documentation / git-show-ref.txton commit Avoid overflowing name buffer in deep directory structures (5d5cea6)
   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
  14DESCRIPTION
  15-----------
  16
  17Displays references available in a local repository along with the associated
  18commit IDs. Results can be filtered using a pattern and tags can be
  19dereferenced into object IDs. Additionally, it can be used to test whether a
  20particular ref exists.
  21
  22Use of this utility is encouraged in favor of directly accessing files under
  23in the `.git` directory.
  24
  25OPTIONS
  26-------
  27
  28-h, --head::
  29
  30        Show the HEAD reference.
  31
  32--tags, --heads::
  33
  34        Limit to only "refs/heads" and "refs/tags", respectively.  These
  35        options are not mutually exclusive; when given both, references stored
  36        in "refs/heads" and "refs/tags" are displayed.
  37
  38-d, --dereference::
  39
  40        Dereference tags into object IDs as well. They will be shown with "^{}"
  41        appended.
  42
  43-s, --hash::
  44
  45        Only show the SHA1 hash, not the reference name. When also using
  46        --dereference the dereferenced tag will still be shown after the SHA1.
  47
  48--verify::
  49
  50        Enable stricter reference checking by requiring an exact ref path.
  51        Aside from returning an error code of 1, it will also print an error
  52        message if '--quiet' was not specified.
  53
  54--abbrev, --abbrev=len::
  55
  56        Abbreviate the object name.  When using `--hash`, you do
  57        not have to say `--hash --abbrev`; `--hash=len` would do.
  58
  59-q, --quiet::
  60
  61        Do not print any results to stdout. When combined with '--verify' this
  62        can be used to silently check if a reference exists.
  63
  64<pattern>::
  65
  66        Show references matching one or more patterns.
  67
  68OUTPUT
  69------
  70
  71The output is in the format: '<SHA-1 ID>' '<space>' '<reference name>'.
  72
  73-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  74$ git show-ref --head --dereference
  75832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 HEAD
  76832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 refs/heads/master
  77832e76a9899f560a90ffd62ae2ce83bbeff58f54 refs/heads/origin
  783521017556c5de4159da4615a39fa4d5d2c279b5 refs/tags/v0.99.9c
  796ddc0964034342519a87fe013781abf31c6db6ad refs/tags/v0.99.9c^{}
  80055e4ae3ae6eb344cbabf2a5256a49ea66040131 refs/tags/v1.0rc4
  81423325a2d24638ddcc82ce47be5e40be550f4507 refs/tags/v1.0rc4^{}
  82...
  83-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  84
  85When using --hash (and not --dereference) the output format is: '<SHA-1 ID>'
  86
  87-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  88$ git show-ref --heads --hash
  892e3ba0114a1f52b47df29743d6915d056be13278
  90185008ae97960c8d551adcd9e23565194651b5d1
  9103adf42c988195b50e1a1935ba5fcbc39b2b029b
  92...
  93-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  94
  95EXAMPLE
  96-------
  97
  98To show all references called "master", whether tags or heads or anything
  99else, and regardless of how deep in the reference naming hierarchy they are,
 100use:
 101
 102-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 103        git show-ref master
 104-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 105
 106This will show "refs/heads/master" but also "refs/remote/other-repo/master",
 107if such references exists.
 108
 109When using the '--verify' flag, the command requires an exact path:
 110
 111-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 112        git show-ref --verify refs/heads/master
 113-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 114
 115will only match the exact branch called "master".
 116
 117If nothing matches, gitlink:git-show-ref[1] will return an error code of 1,
 118and in the case of verification, it will show an error message.
 119
 120For scripting, you can ask it to be quiet with the "--quiet" flag, which
 121allows you to do things like
 122
 123-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 124        git-show-ref --quiet --verify -- "refs/heads/$headname" ||
 125                echo "$headname is not a valid branch"
 126-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 127
 128to check whether a particular branch exists or not (notice how we don't
 129actually want to show any results, and we want to use the full refname for it
 130in order to not trigger the problem with ambiguous partial matches).
 131
 132To show only tags, or only proper branch heads, use "--tags" and/or "--heads"
 133respectively (using both means that it shows tags and heads, but not other
 134random references under the refs/ subdirectory).
 135
 136To do automatic tag object dereferencing, use the "-d" or "--dereference"
 137flag, so you can do
 138
 139-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 140        git show-ref --tags --dereference
 141-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 142
 143to get a listing of all tags together with what they dereference.
 144
 145SEE ALSO
 146--------
 147gitlink:git-ls-remote[1], gitlink:git-peek-remote[1]
 148
 149AUTHORS
 150-------
 151Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>.
 152Man page by Jonas Fonseca <fonseca@diku.dk>.
 153
 154GIT
 155---
 156Part of the gitlink:git[7] suite