Documentation / git-send-pack.txton commit format-patch: fix two-argument special case, and make it easier to pick single commits (88b5a74)
   1git-send-pack(1)
   2================
   3
   4NAME
   5----
   6git-send-pack - Push missing objects packed.
   7
   8
   9SYNOPSIS
  10--------
  11'git-send-pack' [--all] [--force] [--exec=<git-receive-pack>] [<host>:]<directory> [<ref>...]
  12
  13DESCRIPTION
  14-----------
  15Invokes 'git-receive-pack' on a possibly remote repository, and
  16updates it from the current repository, sending named refs.
  17
  18
  19OPTIONS
  20-------
  21--exec=<git-receive-pack>::
  22        Path to the 'git-receive-pack' program on the remote
  23        end.  Sometimes useful when pushing to a remote
  24        repository over ssh, and you do not have the program in
  25        a directory on the default $PATH.
  26
  27--all::
  28        Instead of explicitly specifying which refs to update,
  29        update all refs that locally exist.
  30
  31--force::
  32        Usually, the command refuses to update a remote ref that
  33        is not an ancestor of the local ref used to overwrite it.
  34        This flag disables the check.  What this means is that
  35        the remote repository can lose commits; use it with
  36        care.
  37
  38<host>::
  39        A remote host to house the repository.  When this
  40        part is specified, 'git-receive-pack' is invoked via
  41        ssh.
  42
  43<directory>::
  44        The repository to update.
  45
  46<ref>...:
  47        The remote refs to update.
  48
  49
  50Specifying the Refs
  51-------------------
  52
  53There are three ways to specify which refs to update on the
  54remote end.
  55
  56With '--all' flag, all refs that exist locally are transfered to
  57the remote side.  You cannot specify any '<ref>' if you use
  58this flag.
  59
  60Without '--all' and without any '<ref>', the refs that exist
  61both on the local side and on the remote side are updated.
  62
  63When one or more '<ref>' are specified explicitly, it can be either a
  64single pattern, or a pair of such pattern separated by a colon
  65":" (this means that a ref name cannot have a colon in it).  A
  66single pattern '<name>' is just a shorthand for '<name>:<name>'.
  67
  68Each pattern pair consists of the source side (before the colon)
  69and the destination side (after the colon).  The ref to be
  70pushed is determined by finding a match that matches the source
  71side, and where it is pushed is determined by using the
  72destination side.
  73
  74 - It is an error if <src> does not match exactly one of the
  75   local refs.
  76
  77 - It is an error if <dst> matches more than one remote refs.
  78
  79 - If <dst> does not match any remote ref, either
  80
  81   * it has to start with "refs/"; <dst> is used as the
  82     destination literally in this case.
  83
  84   * <src> == <dst> and the ref that matched the <src> must not
  85     exist in the set of remote refs; the ref matched <src>
  86     locally is used as the name of the destination.
  87
  88Without '--force', the <src> ref is stored at the remote only if
  89<dst> does not exist, or <dst> is a proper subset (i.e. an
  90ancestor) of <src>.  This check, known as "fast forward check",
  91is performed in order to avoid accidentally overwriting the
  92remote ref and lose other peoples' commits from there.
  93
  94With '--force', the fast forward check is disabled for all refs.
  95
  96Optionally, a <ref> parameter can be prefixed with a plus '+' sign
  97to disable the fast-forward check only on that ref.
  98
  99
 100Author
 101------
 102Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
 103
 104Documentation
 105--------------
 106Documentation by Junio C Hamano.
 107
 108GIT
 109---
 110Part of the gitlink:git[7] suite