1CONFIGURATION FILE 2------------------ 3 4The git configuration file contains a number of variables that affect 5the git command's behavior. `.git/config` file for each repository 6is used to store the information for that repository, and 7`$HOME/.gitconfig` is used to store per user information to give 8fallback values for `.git/config` file. The file `/etc/gitconfig` 9can be used to store system-wide defaults. 10 11They can be used by both the git plumbing 12and the porcelains. The variables are divided into sections, where 13in the fully qualified variable name the variable itself is the last 14dot-separated segment and the section name is everything before the last 15dot. The variable names are case-insensitive and only alphanumeric 16characters are allowed. Some variables may appear multiple times. 17 18Syntax 19~~~~~~ 20 21The syntax is fairly flexible and permissive; whitespaces are mostly 22ignored. The '#' and ';' characters begin comments to the end of line, 23blank lines are ignored. 24 25The file consists of sections and variables. A section begins with 26the name of the section in square brackets and continues until the next 27section begins. Section names are not case sensitive. Only alphanumeric 28characters, '`-`' and '`.`' are allowed in section names. Each variable 29must belong to some section, which means that there must be section 30header before first setting of a variable. 31 32Sections can be further divided into subsections. To begin a subsection 33put its name in double quotes, separated by space from the section name, 34in the section header, like in example below: 35 36-------- 37 [section "subsection"] 38 39-------- 40 41Subsection names can contain any characters except newline (doublequote 42'`"`' and backslash have to be escaped as '`\"`' and '`\\`', 43respectively) and are case sensitive. Section header cannot span multiple 44lines. Variables may belong directly to a section or to a given subsection. 45You can have `[section]` if you have `[section "subsection"]`, but you 46don't need to. 47 48There is also (case insensitive) alternative `[section.subsection]` syntax. 49In this syntax subsection names follow the same restrictions as for section 50name. 51 52All the other lines are recognized as setting variables, in the form 53'name = value'. If there is no equal sign on the line, the entire line 54is taken as 'name' and the variable is recognized as boolean "true". 55The variable names are case-insensitive and only alphanumeric 56characters and '`-`' are allowed. There can be more than one value 57for a given variable; we say then that variable is multivalued. 58 59Leading and trailing whitespace in a variable value is discarded. 60Internal whitespace within a variable value is retained verbatim. 61 62The values following the equals sign in variable assign are all either 63a string, an integer, or a boolean. Boolean values may be given as yes/no, 640/1 or true/false. Case is not significant in boolean values, when 65converting value to the canonical form using '--bool' type specifier; 66`git-config` will ensure that the output is "true" or "false". 67 68String values may be entirely or partially enclosed in double quotes. 69You need to enclose variable value in double quotes if you want to 70preserve leading or trailing whitespace, or if variable value contains 71beginning of comment characters (if it contains '#' or ';'). 72Double quote '`"`' and backslash '`\`' characters in variable value must 73be escaped: use '`\"`' for '`"`' and '`\\`' for '`\`'. 74 75The following escape sequences (beside '`\"`' and '`\\`') are recognized: 76'`\n`' for newline character (NL), '`\t`' for horizontal tabulation (HT, TAB) 77and '`\b`' for backspace (BS). No other char escape sequence, nor octal 78char sequences are valid. 79 80Variable value ending in a '`\`' is continued on the next line in the 81customary UNIX fashion. 82 83Some variables may require special value format. 84 85Example 86~~~~~~~ 87 88 # Core variables 89 [core] 90 ; Don't trust file modes 91 filemode = false 92 93 # Our diff algorithm 94 [diff] 95 external = "/usr/local/bin/gnu-diff -u" 96 renames = true 97 98 [branch "devel"] 99 remote = origin 100 merge = refs/heads/devel 101 102 # Proxy settings 103 [core] 104 gitProxy="ssh" for "ssh://kernel.org/" 105 gitProxy=default-proxy ; for the rest 106 107Variables 108~~~~~~~~~ 109 110Note that this list is non-comprehensive and not necessarily complete. 111For command-specific variables, you will find a more detailed description 112in the appropriate manual page. You will find a description of non-core 113porcelain configuration variables in the respective porcelain documentation. 114 115core.fileMode:: 116 If false, the executable bit differences between the index and 117 the working copy are ignored; useful on broken filesystems like FAT. 118 See gitlink:git-update-index[1]. True by default. 119 120core.symlinks:: 121 If false, symbolic links are checked out as small plain files that 122 contain the link text. gitlink:git-update-index[1] and 123 gitlink:git-add[1] will not change the recorded type to regular 124 file. Useful on filesystems like FAT that do not support 125 symbolic links. True by default. 126 127core.gitProxy:: 128 A "proxy command" to execute (as 'command host port') instead 129 of establishing direct connection to the remote server when 130 using the git protocol for fetching. If the variable value is 131 in the "COMMAND for DOMAIN" format, the command is applied only 132 on hostnames ending with the specified domain string. This variable 133 may be set multiple times and is matched in the given order; 134 the first match wins. 135+ 136Can be overridden by the 'GIT_PROXY_COMMAND' environment variable 137(which always applies universally, without the special "for" 138handling). 139 140core.ignoreStat:: 141 The working copy files are assumed to stay unchanged until you 142 mark them otherwise manually - Git will not detect the file changes 143 by lstat() calls. This is useful on systems where those are very 144 slow, such as Microsoft Windows. See gitlink:git-update-index[1]. 145 False by default. 146 147core.preferSymlinkRefs:: 148 Instead of the default "symref" format for HEAD 149 and other symbolic reference files, use symbolic links. 150 This is sometimes needed to work with old scripts that 151 expect HEAD to be a symbolic link. 152 153core.bare:: 154 If true this repository is assumed to be 'bare' and has no 155 working directory associated with it. If this is the case a 156 number of commands that require a working directory will be 157 disabled, such as gitlink:git-add[1] or gitlink:git-merge[1]. 158+ 159This setting is automatically guessed by gitlink:git-clone[1] or 160gitlink:git-init[1] when the repository was created. By default a 161repository that ends in "/.git" is assumed to be not bare (bare = 162false), while all other repositories are assumed to be bare (bare 163= true). 164 165core.logAllRefUpdates:: 166 Updates to a ref <ref> is logged to the file 167 "$GIT_DIR/logs/<ref>", by appending the new and old 168 SHA1, the date/time and the reason of the update, but 169 only when the file exists. If this configuration 170 variable is set to true, missing "$GIT_DIR/logs/<ref>" 171 file is automatically created for branch heads. 172+ 173This information can be used to determine what commit 174was the tip of a branch "2 days ago". 175+ 176This value is true by default in a repository that has 177a working directory associated with it, and false by 178default in a bare repository. 179 180core.repositoryFormatVersion:: 181 Internal variable identifying the repository format and layout 182 version. 183 184core.sharedRepository:: 185 When 'group' (or 'true'), the repository is made shareable between 186 several users in a group (making sure all the files and objects are 187 group-writable). When 'all' (or 'world' or 'everybody'), the 188 repository will be readable by all users, additionally to being 189 group-shareable. When 'umask' (or 'false'), git will use permissions 190 reported by umask(2). See gitlink:git-init[1]. False by default. 191 192core.warnAmbiguousRefs:: 193 If true, git will warn you if the ref name you passed it is ambiguous 194 and might match multiple refs in the .git/refs/ tree. True by default. 195 196core.compression:: 197 An integer -1..9, indicating the compression level for objects that 198 are not in a pack file. -1 is the zlib and git default. 0 means no 199 compression, and 1..9 are various speed/size tradeoffs, 9 being 200 slowest. 201 202core.legacyheaders:: 203 A boolean which 204 changes the format of loose objects so that they are more 205 efficient to pack and to send out of the repository over git 206 native protocol, since v1.4.2. However, loose objects 207 written in the new format cannot be read by git older than 208 that version; people fetching from your repository using 209 older versions of git over dumb transports (e.g. http) 210 will also be affected. 211+ 212To let git use the new loose object format, you have to 213set core.legacyheaders to false. 214 215core.packedGitWindowSize:: 216 Number of bytes of a pack file to map into memory in a 217 single mapping operation. Larger window sizes may allow 218 your system to process a smaller number of large pack files 219 more quickly. Smaller window sizes will negatively affect 220 performance due to increased calls to the operating system's 221 memory manager, but may improve performance when accessing 222 a large number of large pack files. 223+ 224Default is 1 MiB if NO_MMAP was set at compile time, otherwise 32 225MiB on 32 bit platforms and 1 GiB on 64 bit platforms. This should 226be reasonable for all users/operating systems. You probably do 227not need to adjust this value. 228+ 229Common unit suffixes of 'k', 'm', or 'g' are supported. 230 231core.packedGitLimit:: 232 Maximum number of bytes to map simultaneously into memory 233 from pack files. If Git needs to access more than this many 234 bytes at once to complete an operation it will unmap existing 235 regions to reclaim virtual address space within the process. 236+ 237Default is 256 MiB on 32 bit platforms and 8 GiB on 64 bit platforms. 238This should be reasonable for all users/operating systems, except on 239the largest projects. You probably do not need to adjust this value. 240+ 241Common unit suffixes of 'k', 'm', or 'g' are supported. 242 243alias.*:: 244 Command aliases for the gitlink:git[1] command wrapper - e.g. 245 after defining "alias.last = cat-file commit HEAD", the invocation 246 "git last" is equivalent to "git cat-file commit HEAD". To avoid 247 confusion and troubles with script usage, aliases that 248 hide existing git commands are ignored. Arguments are split by 249 spaces, the usual shell quoting and escaping is supported. 250 quote pair and a backslash can be used to quote them. 251 252 If the alias expansion is prefixed with an exclamation point, 253 it will be treated as a shell command. For example, defining 254 "alias.new = !gitk --all --not ORIG_HEAD", the invocation 255 "git new" is equivalent to running the shell command 256 "gitk --all --not ORIG_HEAD". 257 258apply.whitespace:: 259 Tells `git-apply` how to handle whitespaces, in the same way 260 as the '--whitespace' option. See gitlink:git-apply[1]. 261 262branch.<name>.remote:: 263 When in branch <name>, it tells `git fetch` which remote to fetch. 264 If this option is not given, `git fetch` defaults to remote "origin". 265 266branch.<name>.merge:: 267 When in branch <name>, it tells `git fetch` the default refspec to 268 be marked for merging in FETCH_HEAD. The value has exactly to match 269 a remote part of one of the refspecs which are fetched from the remote 270 given by "branch.<name>.remote". 271 The merge information is used by `git pull` (which at first calls 272 `git fetch`) to lookup the default branch for merging. Without 273 this option, `git pull` defaults to merge the first refspec fetched. 274 Specify multiple values to get an octopus merge. 275 276color.branch:: 277 A boolean to enable/disable color in the output of 278 gitlink:git-branch[1]. May be set to `true` (or `always`), 279 `false` (or `never`) or `auto`, in which case colors are used 280 only when the output is to a terminal. Defaults to false. 281 282color.branch.<slot>:: 283 Use customized color for branch coloration. `<slot>` is one of 284 `current` (the current branch), `local` (a local branch), 285 `remote` (a tracking branch in refs/remotes/), `plain` (other 286 refs). 287+ 288The value for these configuration variables is a list of colors (at most 289two) and attributes (at most one), separated by spaces. The colors 290accepted are `normal`, `black`, `red`, `green`, `yellow`, `blue`, 291`magenta`, `cyan` and `white`; the attributes are `bold`, `dim`, `ul`, 292`blink` and `reverse`. The first color given is the foreground; the 293second is the background. The position of the attribute, if any, 294doesn't matter. 295 296color.diff:: 297 When true (or `always`), always use colors in patch. 298 When false (or `never`), never. When set to `auto`, use 299 colors only when the output is to the terminal. 300 301color.diff.<slot>:: 302 Use customized color for diff colorization. `<slot>` specifies 303 which part of the patch to use the specified color, and is one 304 of `plain` (context text), `meta` (metainformation), `frag` 305 (hunk header), `old` (removed lines), `new` (added lines), 306 `commit` (commit headers), or `whitespace` (highlighting dubious 307 whitespace). The values of these variables may be specified as 308 in color.branch.<slot>. 309 310color.pager:: 311 A boolean to enable/disable colored output when the pager is in 312 use (default is true). 313 314color.status:: 315 A boolean to enable/disable color in the output of 316 gitlink:git-status[1]. May be set to `true` (or `always`), 317 `false` (or `never`) or `auto`, in which case colors are used 318 only when the output is to a terminal. Defaults to false. 319 320color.status.<slot>:: 321 Use customized color for status colorization. `<slot>` is 322 one of `header` (the header text of the status message), 323 `added` or `updated` (files which are added but not committed), 324 `changed` (files which are changed but not added in the index), 325 or `untracked` (files which are not tracked by git). The values of 326 these variables may be specified as in color.branch.<slot>. 327 328diff.renameLimit:: 329 The number of files to consider when performing the copy/rename 330 detection; equivalent to the git diff option '-l'. 331 332diff.renames:: 333 Tells git to detect renames. If set to any boolean value, it 334 will enable basic rename detection. If set to "copies" or 335 "copy", it will detect copies, as well. 336 337fetch.unpackLimit:: 338 If the number of objects fetched over the git native 339 transfer is below this 340 limit, then the objects will be unpacked into loose object 341 files. However if the number of received objects equals or 342 exceeds this limit then the received pack will be stored as 343 a pack, after adding any missing delta bases. Storing the 344 pack from a push can make the push operation complete faster, 345 especially on slow filesystems. 346 347format.headers:: 348 Additional email headers to include in a patch to be submitted 349 by mail. See gitlink:git-format-patch[1]. 350 351format.suffix:: 352 The default for format-patch is to output files with the suffix 353 `.patch`. Use this variable to change that suffix (make sure to 354 include the dot if you want it). 355 356gc.packrefs:: 357 `git gc` does not run `git pack-refs` in a bare repository by 358 default so that older dumb-transport clients can still fetch 359 from the repository. Setting this to `true` lets `git 360 gc` to run `git pack-refs`. Setting this to `false` tells 361 `git gc` never to run `git pack-refs`. The default setting is 362 `notbare`. Enable it only when you know you do not have to 363 support such clients. The default setting will change to `true` 364 at some stage, and setting this to `false` will continue to 365 prevent `git pack-refs` from being run from `git gc`. 366 367gc.reflogexpire:: 368 `git reflog expire` removes reflog entries older than 369 this time; defaults to 90 days. 370 371gc.reflogexpireunreachable:: 372 `git reflog expire` removes reflog entries older than 373 this time and are not reachable from the current tip; 374 defaults to 30 days. 375 376gc.rerereresolved:: 377 Records of conflicted merge you resolved earlier are 378 kept for this many days when `git rerere gc` is run. 379 The default is 60 days. See gitlink:git-rerere[1]. 380 381gc.rerereunresolved:: 382 Records of conflicted merge you have not resolved are 383 kept for this many days when `git rerere gc` is run. 384 The default is 15 days. See gitlink:git-rerere[1]. 385 386gitcvs.enabled:: 387 Whether the cvs pserver interface is enabled for this repository. 388 See gitlink:git-cvsserver[1]. 389 390gitcvs.logfile:: 391 Path to a log file where the cvs pserver interface well... logs 392 various stuff. See gitlink:git-cvsserver[1]. 393 394http.sslVerify:: 395 Whether to verify the SSL certificate when fetching or pushing 396 over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY' environment 397 variable. 398 399http.sslCert:: 400 File containing the SSL certificate when fetching or pushing 401 over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_SSL_CERT' environment 402 variable. 403 404http.sslKey:: 405 File containing the SSL private key when fetching or pushing 406 over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_SSL_KEY' environment 407 variable. 408 409http.sslCAInfo:: 410 File containing the certificates to verify the peer with when 411 fetching or pushing over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 412 'GIT_SSL_CAINFO' environment variable. 413 414http.sslCAPath:: 415 Path containing files with the CA certificates to verify the peer 416 with when fetching or pushing over HTTPS. Can be overridden 417 by the 'GIT_SSL_CAPATH' environment variable. 418 419http.maxRequests:: 420 How many HTTP requests to launch in parallel. Can be overridden 421 by the 'GIT_HTTP_MAX_REQUESTS' environment variable. Default is 5. 422 423http.lowSpeedLimit, http.lowSpeedTime:: 424 If the HTTP transfer speed is less than 'http.lowSpeedLimit' 425 for longer than 'http.lowSpeedTime' seconds, the transfer is aborted. 426 Can be overridden by the 'GIT_HTTP_LOW_SPEED_LIMIT' and 427 'GIT_HTTP_LOW_SPEED_TIME' environment variables. 428 429http.noEPSV:: 430 A boolean which disables using of EPSV ftp command by curl. 431 This can helpful with some "poor" ftp servers which doesn't 432 support EPSV mode. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_CURL_FTP_NO_EPSV' 433 environment variable. Default is false (curl will use EPSV). 434 435i18n.commitEncoding:: 436 Character encoding the commit messages are stored in; git itself 437 does not care per se, but this information is necessary e.g. when 438 importing commits from emails or in the gitk graphical history 439 browser (and possibly at other places in the future or in other 440 porcelains). See e.g. gitlink:git-mailinfo[1]. Defaults to 'utf-8'. 441 442i18n.logOutputEncoding:: 443 Character encoding the commit messages are converted to when 444 running `git-log` and friends. 445 446log.showroot:: 447 If true, the initial commit will be shown as a big creation event. 448 This is equivalent to a diff against an empty tree. 449 Tools like gitlink:git-log[1] or gitlink:git-whatchanged[1], which 450 normally hide the root commit will now show it. True by default. 451 452merge.summary:: 453 Whether to include summaries of merged commits in newly created 454 merge commit messages. False by default. 455 456merge.verbosity:: 457 Controls the amount of output shown by the recursive merge 458 strategy. Level 0 outputs nothing except a final error 459 message if conflicts were detected. Level 1 outputs only 460 conflicts, 2 outputs conflicts and file changes. Level 5 and 461 above outputs debugging information. The default is level 2. 462 463pack.window:: 464 The size of the window used by gitlink:git-pack-objects[1] when no 465 window size is given on the command line. Defaults to 10. 466 467pull.octopus:: 468 The default merge strategy to use when pulling multiple branches 469 at once. 470 471pull.twohead:: 472 The default merge strategy to use when pulling a single branch. 473 474remote.<name>.url:: 475 The URL of a remote repository. See gitlink:git-fetch[1] or 476 gitlink:git-push[1]. 477 478remote.<name>.fetch:: 479 The default set of "refspec" for gitlink:git-fetch[1]. See 480 gitlink:git-fetch[1]. 481 482remote.<name>.push:: 483 The default set of "refspec" for gitlink:git-push[1]. See 484 gitlink:git-push[1]. 485 486remote.<name>.skipDefaultUpdate:: 487 If true, this remote will be skipped by default when updating 488 using the remote subcommand of gitlink:git-remote[1]. 489 490remote.<name>.receivepack:: 491 The default program to execute on the remote side when pushing. See 492 option \--exec of gitlink:git-push[1]. 493 494remote.<name>.uploadpack:: 495 The default program to execute on the remote side when fetching. See 496 option \--exec of gitlink:git-fetch-pack[1]. 497 498remote.<name>.tagopt:: 499 Setting this value to --no-tags disables automatic tag following when fetching 500 from remote <name> 501 502remotes.<group>:: 503 The list of remotes which are fetched by "git remote update 504 <group>". See gitlink:git-remote[1]. 505 506repack.usedeltabaseoffset:: 507 Allow gitlink:git-repack[1] to create packs that uses 508 delta-base offset. Defaults to false. 509 510show.difftree:: 511 The default gitlink:git-diff-tree[1] arguments to be used 512 for gitlink:git-show[1]. 513 514showbranch.default:: 515 The default set of branches for gitlink:git-show-branch[1]. 516 See gitlink:git-show-branch[1]. 517 518tar.umask:: 519 By default, gitlink:git-tar-tree[1] sets file and directories modes 520 to 0666 or 0777. While this is both useful and acceptable for projects 521 such as the Linux Kernel, it might be excessive for other projects. 522 With this variable, it becomes possible to tell 523 gitlink:git-tar-tree[1] to apply a specific umask to the modes above. 524 The special value "user" indicates that the user's current umask will 525 be used. This should be enough for most projects, as it will lead to 526 the same permissions as gitlink:git-checkout[1] would use. The default 527 value remains 0, which means world read-write. 528 529user.email:: 530 Your email address to be recorded in any newly created commits. 531 Can be overridden by the 'GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL' and 'GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL' 532 environment variables. See gitlink:git-commit-tree[1]. 533 534user.name:: 535 Your full name to be recorded in any newly created commits. 536 Can be overridden by the 'GIT_AUTHOR_NAME' and 'GIT_COMMITTER_NAME' 537 environment variables. See gitlink:git-commit-tree[1]. 538 539user.signingkey:: 540 If gitlink:git-tag[1] is not selecting the key you want it to 541 automatically when creating a signed tag, you can override the 542 default selection with this variable. This option is passed 543 unchanged to gpg's --local-user parameter, so you may specify a key 544 using any method that gpg supports. 545 546whatchanged.difftree:: 547 The default gitlink:git-diff-tree[1] arguments to be used 548 for gitlink:git-whatchanged[1]. 549 550imap:: 551 The configuration variables in the 'imap' section are described 552 in gitlink:git-imap-send[1]. 553 554receive.unpackLimit:: 555 If the number of objects received in a push is below this 556 limit then the objects will be unpacked into loose object 557 files. However if the number of received objects equals or 558 exceeds this limit then the received pack will be stored as 559 a pack, after adding any missing delta bases. Storing the 560 pack from a push can make the push operation complete faster, 561 especially on slow filesystems. 562 563receive.denyNonFastForwards:: 564 If set to true, git-receive-pack will deny a ref update which is 565 not a fast forward. Use this to prevent such an update via a push, 566 even if that push is forced. This configuration variable is 567 set when initializing a shared repository. 568 569transfer.unpackLimit:: 570 When `fetch.unpackLimit` or `receive.unpackLimit` are 571 not set, the value of this variable is used instead. 572 573