1git-branch(1) 2============= 3 4NAME 5---- 6git-branch - List, create, or delete branches 7 8SYNOPSIS 9-------- 10[verse] 11'git-branch' [--color | --no-color] [-r | -a] 12 [-v [--abbrev=<length> | --no-abbrev]] 13 [--contains <commit>] 14'git-branch' [--track | --no-track] [-l] [-f] <branchname> [<start-point>] 15'git-branch' (-m | -M) [<oldbranch>] <newbranch> 16'git-branch' (-d | -D) [-r] <branchname>... 17 18DESCRIPTION 19----------- 20With no arguments given a list of existing branches 21will be shown, the current branch will be highlighted with an asterisk. 22Option `-r` causes the remote-tracking branches to be listed, 23and option `-a` shows both. 24With `--contains <commit>`, shows only the branches that 25contains the named commit (in other words, the branches whose 26tip commits are descendant of the named commit). 27 28In its second form, a new branch named <branchname> will be created. 29It will start out with a head equal to the one given as <start-point>. 30If no <start-point> is given, the branch will be created with a head 31equal to that of the currently checked out branch. 32 33Note that this will create the new branch, but it will not switch the 34working tree to it; use "git checkout <newbranch>" to switch to the 35new branch. 36 37When a local branch is started off a remote branch, git sets up the 38branch so that linkgit:git-pull[1] will appropriately merge from that 39remote branch. If this behavior is not desired, it is possible to 40disable it using the global `branch.autosetupmerge` configuration 41flag. That setting can be overridden by using the `--track` 42and `--no-track` options. 43 44With a '-m' or '-M' option, <oldbranch> will be renamed to <newbranch>. 45If <oldbranch> had a corresponding reflog, it is renamed to match 46<newbranch>, and a reflog entry is created to remember the branch 47renaming. If <newbranch> exists, -M must be used to force the rename 48to happen. 49 50With a `-d` or `-D` option, `<branchname>` will be deleted. You may 51specify more than one branch for deletion. If the branch currently 52has a reflog then the reflog will also be deleted. 53 54Use -r together with -d to delete remote-tracking branches. Note, that it 55only makes sense to delete remote-tracking branches if they no longer exist 56in remote repository or if linkgit:git-fetch[1] was configured not to fetch 57them again. See also 'prune' subcommand of linkgit:git-remote[1] for way to 58clean up all obsolete remote-tracking branches. 59 60 61OPTIONS 62------- 63-d:: 64 Delete a branch. The branch must be fully merged in HEAD. 65 66-D:: 67 Delete a branch irrespective of its merged status. 68 69-l:: 70 Create the branch's reflog. This activates recording of 71 all changes made to the branch ref, enabling use of date 72 based sha1 expressions such as "<branchname>@\{yesterday}". 73 74-f:: 75 Force the creation of a new branch even if it means deleting 76 a branch that already exists with the same name. 77 78-m:: 79 Move/rename a branch and the corresponding reflog. 80 81-M:: 82 Move/rename a branch even if the new branchname already exists. 83 84--color:: 85 Color branches to highlight current, local, and remote branches. 86 87--no-color:: 88 Turn off branch colors, even when the configuration file gives the 89 default to color output. 90 91-r:: 92 List or delete (if used with -d) the remote-tracking branches. 93 94-a:: 95 List both remote-tracking branches and local branches. 96 97-v, --verbose:: 98 Show sha1 and commit subject line for each head. 99 100--abbrev=<length>:: 101 Alter minimum display length for sha1 in output listing, 102 default value is 7. 103 104--no-abbrev:: 105 Display the full sha1s in output listing rather than abbreviating them. 106 107--track:: 108 Set up configuration so that git-pull will automatically 109 retrieve data from the remote branch. Use this if you always 110 pull from the same remote branch into the new branch, or if you 111 don't want to use "git pull <repository> <refspec>" explicitly. 112 This behavior is the default. Set the 113 branch.autosetupmerge configuration variable to false if you 114 want git-checkout and git-branch to always behave as if 115 '--no-track' were given. 116 117--no-track:: 118 When a branch is created off a remote branch, 119 set up configuration so that git-pull will not retrieve data 120 from the remote branch, ignoring the branch.autosetupmerge 121 configuration variable. 122 123<branchname>:: 124 The name of the branch to create or delete. 125 The new branch name must pass all checks defined by 126 linkgit:git-check-ref-format[1]. Some of these checks 127 may restrict the characters allowed in a branch name. 128 129<start-point>:: 130 The new branch will be created with a HEAD equal to this. It may 131 be given as a branch name, a commit-id, or a tag. If this option 132 is omitted, the current branch is assumed. 133 134<oldbranch>:: 135 The name of an existing branch to rename. 136 137<newbranch>:: 138 The new name for an existing branch. The same restrictions as for 139 <branchname> applies. 140 141 142Examples 143-------- 144 145Start development off of a known tag:: 146+ 147------------ 148$ git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/.../linux-2.6 my2.6 149$ cd my2.6 150$ git branch my2.6.14 v2.6.14 <1> 151$ git checkout my2.6.14 152------------ 153+ 154<1> This step and the next one could be combined into a single step with 155"checkout -b my2.6.14 v2.6.14". 156 157Delete unneeded branch:: 158+ 159------------ 160$ git clone git://git.kernel.org/.../git.git my.git 161$ cd my.git 162$ git branch -d -r origin/todo origin/html origin/man <1> 163$ git branch -D test <2> 164------------ 165+ 166<1> Delete remote-tracking branches "todo", "html", "man". Next 'fetch' or 167'pull' will create them again unless you configure them not to. See 168linkgit:git-fetch[1]. 169<2> Delete "test" branch even if the "master" branch (or whichever branch is 170currently checked out) does not have all commits from test branch. 171 172 173Notes 174----- 175 176If you are creating a branch that you want to immediately checkout, it's 177easier to use the git checkout command with its `-b` option to create 178a branch and check it out with a single command. 179 180 181Author 182------ 183Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org> and Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net> 184 185Documentation 186-------------- 187Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org>. 188 189GIT 190--- 191Part of the linkgit:git[7] suite