Documentation / git-svn.txton commit symbolic ref: refuse non-ref targets in HEAD (afe5d3d)
   1git-svn(1)
   2==========
   3
   4NAME
   5----
   6git-svn - Bidirectional operation between a single Subversion branch and git
   7
   8SYNOPSIS
   9--------
  10'git svn' <command> [options] [arguments]
  11
  12DESCRIPTION
  13-----------
  14'git-svn' is a simple conduit for changesets between Subversion and git.
  15It provides a bidirectional flow of changes between a Subversion and a git
  16repository.
  17
  18'git-svn' can track a single Subversion branch simply by using a
  19URL to the branch, follow branches laid out in the Subversion recommended
  20method (trunk, branches, tags directories) with the --stdlayout option, or
  21follow branches in any layout with the -T/-t/-b options (see options to
  22'init' below, and also the 'clone' command).
  23
  24Once tracking a Subversion branch (with any of the above methods), the git
  25repository can be updated from Subversion by the 'fetch' command and
  26Subversion updated from git by the 'dcommit' command.
  27
  28COMMANDS
  29--------
  30--
  31
  32'init'::
  33        Initializes an empty git repository with additional
  34        metadata directories for 'git-svn'.  The Subversion URL
  35        may be specified as a command-line argument, or as full
  36        URL arguments to -T/-t/-b.  Optionally, the target
  37        directory to operate on can be specified as a second
  38        argument.  Normally this command initializes the current
  39        directory.
  40
  41-T<trunk_subdir>;;
  42--trunk=<trunk_subdir>;;
  43-t<tags_subdir>;;
  44--tags=<tags_subdir>;;
  45-b<branches_subdir>;;
  46--branches=<branches_subdir>;;
  47-s;;
  48--stdlayout;;
  49        These are optional command-line options for init.  Each of
  50        these flags can point to a relative repository path
  51        (--tags=project/tags') or a full url
  52        (--tags=https://foo.org/project/tags). The option --stdlayout is
  53        a shorthand way of setting trunk,tags,branches as the relative paths,
  54        which is the Subversion default. If any of the other options are given
  55        as well, they take precedence.
  56--no-metadata;;
  57        Set the 'noMetadata' option in the [svn-remote] config.
  58--use-svm-props;;
  59        Set the 'useSvmProps' option in the [svn-remote] config.
  60--use-svnsync-props;;
  61        Set the 'useSvnsyncProps' option in the [svn-remote] config.
  62--rewrite-root=<URL>;;
  63        Set the 'rewriteRoot' option in the [svn-remote] config.
  64--use-log-author;;
  65        When retrieving svn commits into git (as part of fetch, rebase, or
  66        dcommit operations), look for the first From: or Signed-off-by: line
  67        in the log message and use that as the author string.
  68--add-author-from;;
  69        When committing to svn from git (as part of commit or dcommit
  70        operations), if the existing log message doesn't already have a
  71        From: or Signed-off-by: line, append a From: line based on the
  72        git commit's author string.  If you use this, then --use-log-author
  73        will retrieve a valid author string for all commits.
  74--username=<USER>;;
  75        For transports that SVN handles authentication for (http,
  76        https, and plain svn), specify the username.  For other
  77        transports (eg svn+ssh://), you must include the username in
  78        the URL, eg svn+ssh://foo@svn.bar.com/project
  79--prefix=<prefix>;;
  80        This allows one to specify a prefix which is prepended
  81        to the names of remotes if trunk/branches/tags are
  82        specified.  The prefix does not automatically include a
  83        trailing slash, so be sure you include one in the
  84        argument if that is what you want.  If --branches/-b is
  85        specified, the prefix must include a trailing slash.
  86        Setting a prefix is useful if you wish to track multiple
  87        projects that share a common repository.
  88
  89'fetch'::
  90        Fetch unfetched revisions from the Subversion remote we are
  91        tracking.  The name of the [svn-remote "..."] section in the
  92        .git/config file may be specified as an optional command-line
  93        argument.
  94
  95'clone'::
  96        Runs 'init' and 'fetch'.  It will automatically create a
  97        directory based on the basename of the URL passed to it;
  98        or if a second argument is passed; it will create a directory
  99        and work within that.  It accepts all arguments that the
 100        'init' and 'fetch' commands accept; with the exception of
 101        '--fetch-all'.   After a repository is cloned, the 'fetch'
 102        command will be able to update revisions without affecting
 103        the working tree; and the 'rebase' command will be able
 104        to update the working tree with the latest changes.
 105
 106'rebase'::
 107        This fetches revisions from the SVN parent of the current HEAD
 108        and rebases the current (uncommitted to SVN) work against it.
 109
 110This works similarly to `svn update` or 'git-pull' except that
 111it preserves linear history with 'git-rebase' instead of
 112'git-merge' for ease of dcommitting with 'git-svn'.
 113
 114This accepts all options that 'git-svn fetch' and 'git-rebase'
 115accept.  However, '--fetch-all' only fetches from the current
 116[svn-remote], and not all [svn-remote] definitions.
 117
 118Like 'git-rebase'; this requires that the working tree be clean
 119and have no uncommitted changes.
 120
 121-l;;
 122--local;;
 123        Do not fetch remotely; only run 'git-rebase' against the
 124        last fetched commit from the upstream SVN.
 125
 126'dcommit'::
 127        Commit each diff from a specified head directly to the SVN
 128        repository, and then rebase or reset (depending on whether or
 129        not there is a diff between SVN and head).  This will create
 130        a revision in SVN for each commit in git.
 131        It is recommended that you run 'git-svn' fetch and rebase (not
 132        pull or merge) your commits against the latest changes in the
 133        SVN repository.
 134        An optional command-line argument may be specified as an
 135        alternative to HEAD.
 136        This is advantageous over 'set-tree' (below) because it produces
 137        cleaner, more linear history.
 138+
 139--no-rebase;;
 140        After committing, do not rebase or reset.
 141--commit-url <URL>;;
 142        Commit to this SVN URL (the full path).  This is intended to
 143        allow existing git-svn repositories created with one transport
 144        method (e.g. `svn://` or `http://` for anonymous read) to be
 145        reused if a user is later given access to an alternate transport
 146        method (e.g. `svn+ssh://` or `https://`) for commit.
 147
 148        Using this option for any other purpose (don't ask)
 149        is very strongly discouraged.
 150--
 151
 152'branch'::
 153        Create a branch in the SVN repository.
 154
 155-m;;
 156--message;;
 157        Allows to specify the commit message.
 158
 159-t;;
 160--tag;;
 161        Create a tag by using the tags_subdir instead of the branches_subdir
 162        specified during git svn init.
 163
 164'tag'::
 165        Create a tag in the SVN repository. This is a shorthand for
 166        'branch -t'.
 167
 168'log'::
 169        This should make it easy to look up svn log messages when svn
 170        users refer to -r/--revision numbers.
 171+
 172The following features from `svn log' are supported:
 173+
 174--
 175--revision=<n>[:<n>];;
 176        is supported, non-numeric args are not:
 177        HEAD, NEXT, BASE, PREV, etc ...
 178-v/--verbose;;
 179        it's not completely compatible with the --verbose
 180        output in svn log, but reasonably close.
 181--limit=<n>;;
 182        is NOT the same as --max-count, doesn't count
 183        merged/excluded commits
 184--incremental;;
 185        supported
 186--
 187+
 188New features:
 189+
 190--
 191--show-commit;;
 192        shows the git commit sha1, as well
 193--oneline;;
 194        our version of --pretty=oneline
 195--
 196+
 197NOTE: SVN itself only stores times in UTC and nothing else. The regular svn
 198client converts the UTC time to the local time (or based on the TZ=
 199environment). This command has the same behaviour.
 200+
 201Any other arguments are passed directly to 'git-log'
 202
 203'blame'::
 204       Show what revision and author last modified each line of a file. The
 205       output of this mode is format-compatible with the output of
 206       `svn blame' by default. Like the SVN blame command,
 207       local uncommitted changes in the working copy are ignored;
 208       the version of the file in the HEAD revision is annotated. Unknown
 209       arguments are passed directly to 'git-blame'.
 210+
 211--git-format;;
 212        Produce output in the same format as 'git-blame', but with
 213        SVN revision numbers instead of git commit hashes. In this mode,
 214        changes that haven't been committed to SVN (including local
 215        working-copy edits) are shown as revision 0.
 216
 217--
 218'find-rev'::
 219        When given an SVN revision number of the form 'rN', returns the
 220        corresponding git commit hash (this can optionally be followed by a
 221        tree-ish to specify which branch should be searched).  When given a
 222        tree-ish, returns the corresponding SVN revision number.
 223
 224'set-tree'::
 225        You should consider using 'dcommit' instead of this command.
 226        Commit specified commit or tree objects to SVN.  This relies on
 227        your imported fetch data being up-to-date.  This makes
 228        absolutely no attempts to do patching when committing to SVN, it
 229        simply overwrites files with those specified in the tree or
 230        commit.  All merging is assumed to have taken place
 231        independently of 'git-svn' functions.
 232
 233'create-ignore'::
 234        Recursively finds the svn:ignore property on directories and
 235        creates matching .gitignore files. The resulting files are staged to
 236        be committed, but are not committed. Use -r/--revision to refer to a
 237        specific revision.
 238
 239'show-ignore'::
 240        Recursively finds and lists the svn:ignore property on
 241        directories.  The output is suitable for appending to
 242        the $GIT_DIR/info/exclude file.
 243
 244'commit-diff'::
 245        Commits the diff of two tree-ish arguments from the
 246        command-line.  This command does not rely on being inside an `git-svn
 247        init`-ed repository.  This command takes three arguments, (a) the
 248        original tree to diff against, (b) the new tree result, (c) the
 249        URL of the target Subversion repository.  The final argument
 250        (URL) may be omitted if you are working from a 'git-svn'-aware
 251        repository (that has been `init`-ed with 'git-svn').
 252        The -r<revision> option is required for this.
 253
 254'info'::
 255        Shows information about a file or directory similar to what
 256        `svn info' provides.  Does not currently support a -r/--revision
 257        argument.  Use the --url option to output only the value of the
 258        'URL:' field.
 259
 260'proplist'::
 261        Lists the properties stored in the Subversion repository about a
 262        given file or directory.  Use -r/--revision to refer to a specific
 263        Subversion revision.
 264
 265'propget'::
 266        Gets the Subversion property given as the first argument, for a
 267        file.  A specific revision can be specified with -r/--revision.
 268
 269'show-externals'::
 270        Shows the Subversion externals.  Use -r/--revision to specify a
 271        specific revision.
 272
 273--
 274
 275OPTIONS
 276-------
 277--
 278
 279--shared[={false|true|umask|group|all|world|everybody}]::
 280--template=<template_directory>::
 281        Only used with the 'init' command.
 282        These are passed directly to 'git-init'.
 283
 284-r <ARG>::
 285--revision <ARG>::
 286
 287Used with the 'fetch' command.
 288
 289This allows revision ranges for partial/cauterized history
 290to be supported.  $NUMBER, $NUMBER1:$NUMBER2 (numeric ranges),
 291$NUMBER:HEAD, and BASE:$NUMBER are all supported.
 292
 293This can allow you to make partial mirrors when running fetch;
 294but is generally not recommended because history will be skipped
 295and lost.
 296
 297-::
 298--stdin::
 299
 300Only used with the 'set-tree' command.
 301
 302Read a list of commits from stdin and commit them in reverse
 303order.  Only the leading sha1 is read from each line, so
 304'git-rev-list --pretty=oneline' output can be used.
 305
 306--rmdir::
 307
 308Only used with the 'dcommit', 'set-tree' and 'commit-diff' commands.
 309
 310Remove directories from the SVN tree if there are no files left
 311behind.  SVN can version empty directories, and they are not
 312removed by default if there are no files left in them.  git
 313cannot version empty directories.  Enabling this flag will make
 314the commit to SVN act like git.
 315
 316config key: svn.rmdir
 317
 318-e::
 319--edit::
 320
 321Only used with the 'dcommit', 'set-tree' and 'commit-diff' commands.
 322
 323Edit the commit message before committing to SVN.  This is off by
 324default for objects that are commits, and forced on when committing
 325tree objects.
 326
 327config key: svn.edit
 328
 329-l<num>::
 330--find-copies-harder::
 331
 332Only used with the 'dcommit', 'set-tree' and 'commit-diff' commands.
 333
 334They are both passed directly to 'git-diff-tree'; see
 335linkgit:git-diff-tree[1] for more information.
 336
 337[verse]
 338config key: svn.l
 339config key: svn.findcopiesharder
 340
 341-A<filename>::
 342--authors-file=<filename>::
 343
 344Syntax is compatible with the file used by 'git-cvsimport':
 345
 346------------------------------------------------------------------------
 347        loginname = Joe User <user@example.com>
 348------------------------------------------------------------------------
 349
 350If this option is specified and 'git-svn' encounters an SVN
 351committer name that does not exist in the authors-file, 'git-svn'
 352will abort operation. The user will then have to add the
 353appropriate entry.  Re-running the previous 'git-svn' command
 354after the authors-file is modified should continue operation.
 355
 356config key: svn.authorsfile
 357
 358-q::
 359--quiet::
 360        Make 'git-svn' less verbose.
 361
 362--repack[=<n>]::
 363--repack-flags=<flags>::
 364
 365These should help keep disk usage sane for large fetches
 366with many revisions.
 367
 368--repack takes an optional argument for the number of revisions
 369to fetch before repacking.  This defaults to repacking every
 3701000 commits fetched if no argument is specified.
 371
 372--repack-flags are passed directly to 'git-repack'.
 373
 374[verse]
 375config key: svn.repack
 376config key: svn.repackflags
 377
 378-m::
 379--merge::
 380-s<strategy>::
 381--strategy=<strategy>::
 382
 383These are only used with the 'dcommit' and 'rebase' commands.
 384
 385Passed directly to 'git-rebase' when using 'dcommit' if a
 386'git-reset' cannot be used (see 'dcommit').
 387
 388-n::
 389--dry-run::
 390
 391This can be used with the 'dcommit', 'rebase', 'branch' and 'tag'
 392commands.
 393
 394For 'dcommit', print out the series of git arguments that would show
 395which diffs would be committed to SVN.
 396
 397For 'rebase', display the local branch associated with the upstream svn
 398repository associated with the current branch and the URL of svn
 399repository that will be fetched from.
 400
 401For 'branch' and 'tag', display the urls that will be used for copying when
 402creating the branch or tag.
 403
 404--
 405
 406ADVANCED OPTIONS
 407----------------
 408--
 409
 410-i<GIT_SVN_ID>::
 411--id <GIT_SVN_ID>::
 412
 413This sets GIT_SVN_ID (instead of using the environment).  This
 414allows the user to override the default refname to fetch from
 415when tracking a single URL.  The 'log' and 'dcommit' commands
 416no longer require this switch as an argument.
 417
 418-R<remote name>::
 419--svn-remote <remote name>::
 420        Specify the [svn-remote "<remote name>"] section to use,
 421        this allows SVN multiple repositories to be tracked.
 422        Default: "svn"
 423
 424--follow-parent::
 425        This is especially helpful when we're tracking a directory
 426        that has been moved around within the repository, or if we
 427        started tracking a branch and never tracked the trunk it was
 428        descended from. This feature is enabled by default, use
 429        --no-follow-parent to disable it.
 430
 431config key: svn.followparent
 432
 433--
 434CONFIG FILE-ONLY OPTIONS
 435------------------------
 436--
 437
 438svn.noMetadata::
 439svn-remote.<name>.noMetadata::
 440
 441This gets rid of the 'git-svn-id:' lines at the end of every commit.
 442
 443If you lose your .git/svn/git-svn/.rev_db file, 'git-svn' will not
 444be able to rebuild it and you won't be able to fetch again,
 445either.  This is fine for one-shot imports.
 446
 447The 'git-svn log' command will not work on repositories using
 448this, either.  Using this conflicts with the 'useSvmProps'
 449option for (hopefully) obvious reasons.
 450
 451svn.useSvmProps::
 452svn-remote.<name>.useSvmProps::
 453
 454This allows 'git-svn' to re-map repository URLs and UUIDs from
 455mirrors created using SVN::Mirror (or svk) for metadata.
 456
 457If an SVN revision has a property, "svm:headrev", it is likely
 458that the revision was created by SVN::Mirror (also used by SVK).
 459The property contains a repository UUID and a revision.  We want
 460to make it look like we are mirroring the original URL, so
 461introduce a helper function that returns the original identity
 462URL and UUID, and use it when generating metadata in commit
 463messages.
 464
 465svn.useSvnsyncProps::
 466svn-remote.<name>.useSvnsyncprops::
 467        Similar to the useSvmProps option; this is for users
 468        of the svnsync(1) command distributed with SVN 1.4.x and
 469        later.
 470
 471svn-remote.<name>.rewriteRoot::
 472        This allows users to create repositories from alternate
 473        URLs.  For example, an administrator could run 'git-svn' on the
 474        server locally (accessing via file://) but wish to distribute
 475        the repository with a public http:// or svn:// URL in the
 476        metadata so users of it will see the public URL.
 477
 478--
 479
 480Since the noMetadata, rewriteRoot, useSvnsyncProps and useSvmProps
 481options all affect the metadata generated and used by 'git-svn'; they
 482*must* be set in the configuration file before any history is imported
 483and these settings should never be changed once they are set.
 484
 485Additionally, only one of these four options can be used per-svn-remote
 486section because they affect the 'git-svn-id:' metadata line.
 487
 488
 489BASIC EXAMPLES
 490--------------
 491
 492Tracking and contributing to the trunk of a Subversion-managed project:
 493
 494------------------------------------------------------------------------
 495# Clone a repo (like git clone):
 496        git svn clone http://svn.example.com/project/trunk
 497# Enter the newly cloned directory:
 498        cd trunk
 499# You should be on master branch, double-check with git-branch
 500        git branch
 501# Do some work and commit locally to git:
 502        git commit ...
 503# Something is committed to SVN, rebase your local changes against the
 504# latest changes in SVN:
 505        git svn rebase
 506# Now commit your changes (that were committed previously using git) to SVN,
 507# as well as automatically updating your working HEAD:
 508        git svn dcommit
 509# Append svn:ignore settings to the default git exclude file:
 510        git svn show-ignore >> .git/info/exclude
 511------------------------------------------------------------------------
 512
 513Tracking and contributing to an entire Subversion-managed project
 514(complete with a trunk, tags and branches):
 515
 516------------------------------------------------------------------------
 517# Clone a repo (like git clone):
 518        git svn clone http://svn.example.com/project -T trunk -b branches -t tags
 519# View all branches and tags you have cloned:
 520        git branch -r
 521# Create a new branch in SVN
 522    git svn branch waldo
 523# Reset your master to trunk (or any other branch, replacing 'trunk'
 524# with the appropriate name):
 525        git reset --hard remotes/trunk
 526# You may only dcommit to one branch/tag/trunk at a time.  The usage
 527# of dcommit/rebase/show-ignore should be the same as above.
 528------------------------------------------------------------------------
 529
 530The initial 'git-svn clone' can be quite time-consuming
 531(especially for large Subversion repositories). If multiple
 532people (or one person with multiple machines) want to use
 533'git-svn' to interact with the same Subversion repository, you can
 534do the initial 'git-svn clone' to a repository on a server and
 535have each person clone that repository with 'git-clone':
 536
 537------------------------------------------------------------------------
 538# Do the initial import on a server
 539        ssh server "cd /pub && git svn clone http://svn.example.com/project
 540# Clone locally - make sure the refs/remotes/ space matches the server
 541        mkdir project
 542        cd project
 543        git init
 544        git remote add origin server:/pub/project
 545        git config --add remote.origin.fetch '+refs/remotes/*:refs/remotes/*'
 546        git fetch
 547# Create a local branch from one of the branches just fetched
 548        git checkout -b master FETCH_HEAD
 549# Initialize git-svn locally (be sure to use the same URL and -T/-b/-t options as were used on server)
 550        git svn init http://svn.example.com/project
 551# Pull the latest changes from Subversion
 552        git svn rebase
 553------------------------------------------------------------------------
 554
 555REBASE VS. PULL/MERGE
 556---------------------
 557
 558Originally, 'git-svn' recommended that the 'remotes/git-svn' branch be
 559pulled or merged from.  This is because the author favored
 560`git svn set-tree B` to commit a single head rather than the
 561`git svn set-tree A..B` notation to commit multiple commits.
 562
 563If you use `git svn set-tree A..B` to commit several diffs and you do
 564not have the latest remotes/git-svn merged into my-branch, you should
 565use `git svn rebase` to update your work branch instead of `git pull` or
 566`git merge`.  `pull`/`merge' can cause non-linear history to be flattened
 567when committing into SVN, which can lead to merge commits reversing
 568previous commits in SVN.
 569
 570DESIGN PHILOSOPHY
 571-----------------
 572Merge tracking in Subversion is lacking and doing branched development
 573with Subversion can be cumbersome as a result.  While 'git-svn' can track
 574copy history (including branches and tags) for repositories adopting a
 575standard layout, it cannot yet represent merge history that happened
 576inside git back upstream to SVN users.  Therefore it is advised that
 577users keep history as linear as possible inside git to ease
 578compatibility with SVN (see the CAVEATS section below).
 579
 580CAVEATS
 581-------
 582
 583For the sake of simplicity and interoperating with a less-capable system
 584(SVN), it is recommended that all 'git-svn' users clone, fetch and dcommit
 585directly from the SVN server, and avoid all 'git-clone'/'pull'/'merge'/'push'
 586operations between git repositories and branches.  The recommended
 587method of exchanging code between git branches and users is
 588'git-format-patch' and 'git-am', or just 'dcommit'ing to the SVN repository.
 589
 590Running 'git-merge' or 'git-pull' is NOT recommended on a branch you
 591plan to 'dcommit' from.  Subversion does not represent merges in any
 592reasonable or useful fashion; so users using Subversion cannot see any
 593merges you've made.  Furthermore, if you merge or pull from a git branch
 594that is a mirror of an SVN branch, 'dcommit' may commit to the wrong
 595branch.
 596
 597'git-clone' does not clone branches under the refs/remotes/ hierarchy or
 598any 'git-svn' metadata, or config.  So repositories created and managed with
 599using 'git-svn' should use 'rsync' for cloning, if cloning is to be done
 600at all.
 601
 602Since 'dcommit' uses rebase internally, any git branches you 'git-push' to
 603before 'dcommit' on will require forcing an overwrite of the existing ref
 604on the remote repository.  This is generally considered bad practice,
 605see the linkgit:git-push[1] documentation for details.
 606
 607Do not use the --amend option of linkgit:git-commit[1] on a change you've
 608already dcommitted.  It is considered bad practice to --amend commits
 609you've already pushed to a remote repository for other users, and
 610dcommit with SVN is analogous to that.
 611
 612BUGS
 613----
 614
 615We ignore all SVN properties except svn:executable.  Any unhandled
 616properties are logged to $GIT_DIR/svn/<refname>/unhandled.log
 617
 618Renamed and copied directories are not detected by git and hence not
 619tracked when committing to SVN.  I do not plan on adding support for
 620this as it's quite difficult and time-consuming to get working for all
 621the possible corner cases (git doesn't do it, either).  Committing
 622renamed and copied files are fully supported if they're similar enough
 623for git to detect them.
 624
 625CONFIGURATION
 626-------------
 627
 628'git-svn' stores [svn-remote] configuration information in the
 629repository .git/config file.  It is similar the core git
 630[remote] sections except 'fetch' keys do not accept glob
 631arguments; but they are instead handled by the 'branches'
 632and 'tags' keys.  Since some SVN repositories are oddly
 633configured with multiple projects glob expansions such those
 634listed below are allowed:
 635
 636------------------------------------------------------------------------
 637[svn-remote "project-a"]
 638        url = http://server.org/svn
 639        branches = branches/*/project-a:refs/remotes/project-a/branches/*
 640        tags = tags/*/project-a:refs/remotes/project-a/tags/*
 641        trunk = trunk/project-a:refs/remotes/project-a/trunk
 642------------------------------------------------------------------------
 643
 644Keep in mind that the '*' (asterisk) wildcard of the local ref
 645(right of the ':') *must* be the farthest right path component;
 646however the remote wildcard may be anywhere as long as it's own
 647independent path component (surrounded by '/' or EOL).   This
 648type of configuration is not automatically created by 'init' and
 649should be manually entered with a text-editor or using 'git-config'.
 650
 651SEE ALSO
 652--------
 653linkgit:git-rebase[1]
 654
 655Author
 656------
 657Written by Eric Wong <normalperson@yhbt.net>.
 658
 659Documentation
 660-------------
 661Written by Eric Wong <normalperson@yhbt.net>.