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. 9 10They can be used by both the git plumbing 11and the porcelains. The variables are divided into sections, where 12in the fully qualified variable name the variable itself is the last 13dot-separated segment and the section name is everything before the last 14dot. The variable names are case-insensitive and only alphanumeric 15characters are allowed. Some variables may appear multiple times. 16 17Syntax 18~~~~~~ 19 20The syntax is fairly flexible and permissive; whitespaces are mostly 21ignored. The '#' and ';' characters begin comments to the end of line, 22blank lines are ignored. 23 24The file consists of sections and variables. A section begins with 25the name of the section in square brackets and continues until the next 26section begins. Section names are not case sensitive. Only alphanumeric 27characters, '`-`' and '`.`' are allowed in section names. Each variable 28must belong to some section, which means that there must be section 29header before first setting of a variable. 30 31Sections can be further divided into subsections. To begin a subsection 32put its name in double quotes, separated by space from the section name, 33in the section header, like in example below: 34 35-------- 36 [section "subsection"] 37 38-------- 39 40Subsection names can contain any characters except newline (doublequote 41'`"`' and backslash have to be escaped as '`\"`' and '`\\`', 42respectively) and are case sensitive. Section header cannot span multiple 43lines. Variables may belong directly to a section or to a given subsection. 44You can have `[section]` if you have `[section "subsection"]`, but you 45don't need to. 46 47There is also (case insensitive) alternative `[section.subsection]` syntax. 48In this syntax subsection names follow the same restrictions as for section 49name. 50 51All the other lines are recognized as setting variables, in the form 52'name = value'. If there is no equal sign on the line, the entire line 53is taken as 'name' and the variable is recognized as boolean "true". 54The variable names are case-insensitive and only alphanumeric 55characters and '`-`' are allowed. There can be more than one value 56for a given variable; we say then that variable is multivalued. 57 58Leading and trailing whitespace in a variable value is discarded. 59Internal whitespace within a variable value is retained verbatim. 60 61The values following the equals sign in variable assign are all either 62a string, an integer, or a boolean. Boolean values may be given as yes/no, 630/1 or true/false. Case is not significant in boolean values, when 64converting value to the canonical form using '--bool' type specifier; 65`git-config` will ensure that the output is "true" or "false". 66 67String values may be entirely or partially enclosed in double quotes. 68You need to enclose variable value in double quotes if you want to 69preserve leading or trailing whitespace, or if variable value contains 70beginning of comment characters (if it contains '#' or ';'). 71Double quote '`"`' and backslash '`\`' characters in variable value must 72be escaped: use '`\"`' for '`"`' and '`\\`' for '`\`'. 73 74The following escape sequences (beside '`\"`' and '`\\`') are recognized: 75'`\n`' for newline character (NL), '`\t`' for horizontal tabulation (HT, TAB) 76and '`\b`' for backspace (BS). No other char escape sequence, nor octal 77char sequences are valid. 78 79Variable value ending in a '`\`' is continued on the next line in the 80customary UNIX fashion. 81 82Some variables may require special value format. 83 84Example 85~~~~~~~ 86 87 # Core variables 88 [core] 89 ; Don't trust file modes 90 filemode = false 91 92 # Our diff algorithm 93 [diff] 94 external = "/usr/local/bin/gnu-diff -u" 95 renames = true 96 97 [branch "devel"] 98 remote = origin 99 merge = refs/heads/devel 100 101 # Proxy settings 102 [core] 103 gitProxy="ssh" for "ssh://kernel.org/" 104 gitProxy=default-proxy ; for the rest 105 106Variables 107~~~~~~~~~ 108 109Note that this list is non-comprehensive and not necessarily complete. 110For command-specific variables, you will find a more detailed description 111in the appropriate manual page. You will find a description of non-core 112porcelain configuration variables in the respective porcelain documentation. 113 114core.fileMode:: 115 If false, the executable bit differences between the index and 116 the working copy are ignored; useful on broken filesystems like FAT. 117 See gitlink:git-update-index[1]. True by default. 118 119core.gitProxy:: 120 A "proxy command" to execute (as 'command host port') instead 121 of establishing direct connection to the remote server when 122 using the git protocol for fetching. If the variable value is 123 in the "COMMAND for DOMAIN" format, the command is applied only 124 on hostnames ending with the specified domain string. This variable 125 may be set multiple times and is matched in the given order; 126 the first match wins. 127+ 128Can be overridden by the 'GIT_PROXY_COMMAND' environment variable 129(which always applies universally, without the special "for" 130handling). 131 132core.ignoreStat:: 133 The working copy files are assumed to stay unchanged until you 134 mark them otherwise manually - Git will not detect the file changes 135 by lstat() calls. This is useful on systems where those are very 136 slow, such as Microsoft Windows. See gitlink:git-update-index[1]. 137 False by default. 138 139core.preferSymlinkRefs:: 140 Instead of the default "symref" format for HEAD 141 and other symbolic reference files, use symbolic links. 142 This is sometimes needed to work with old scripts that 143 expect HEAD to be a symbolic link. 144 145core.bare:: 146 If true this repository is assumed to be 'bare' and has no 147 working directory associated with it. If this is the case a 148 number of commands that require a working directory will be 149 disabled, such as gitlink:git-add[1] or gitlink:git-merge[1]. 150+ 151This setting is automatically guessed by gitlink:git-clone[1] or 152gitlink:git-init[1] when the repository was created. By default a 153repository that ends in "/.git" is assumed to be not bare (bare = 154false), while all other repositories are assumed to be bare (bare 155= true). 156 157core.logAllRefUpdates:: 158 Updates to a ref <ref> is logged to the file 159 "$GIT_DIR/logs/<ref>", by appending the new and old 160 SHA1, the date/time and the reason of the update, but 161 only when the file exists. If this configuration 162 variable is set to true, missing "$GIT_DIR/logs/<ref>" 163 file is automatically created for branch heads. 164+ 165This information can be used to determine what commit 166was the tip of a branch "2 days ago". 167+ 168This value is true by default in a repository that has 169a working directory associated with it, and false by 170default in a bare repository. 171 172core.repositoryFormatVersion:: 173 Internal variable identifying the repository format and layout 174 version. 175 176core.sharedRepository:: 177 When 'group' (or 'true'), the repository is made shareable between 178 several users in a group (making sure all the files and objects are 179 group-writable). When 'all' (or 'world' or 'everybody'), the 180 repository will be readable by all users, additionally to being 181 group-shareable. When 'umask' (or 'false'), git will use permissions 182 reported by umask(2). See gitlink:git-init[1]. False by default. 183 184core.warnAmbiguousRefs:: 185 If true, git will warn you if the ref name you passed it is ambiguous 186 and might match multiple refs in the .git/refs/ tree. True by default. 187 188core.compression:: 189 An integer -1..9, indicating the compression level for objects that 190 are not in a pack file. -1 is the zlib and git default. 0 means no 191 compression, and 1..9 are various speed/size tradeoffs, 9 being 192 slowest. 193 194core.legacyheaders:: 195 A boolean which 196 changes the format of loose objects so that they are more 197 efficient to pack and to send out of the repository over git 198 native protocol, since v1.4.2. However, loose objects 199 written in the new format cannot be read by git older than 200 that version; people fetching from your repository using 201 older versions of git over dumb transports (e.g. http) 202 will also be affected. 203+ 204To let git use the new loose object format, you have to 205set core.legacyheaders to false. 206 207core.packedGitWindowSize:: 208 Number of bytes of a pack file to map into memory in a 209 single mapping operation. Larger window sizes may allow 210 your system to process a smaller number of large pack files 211 more quickly. Smaller window sizes will negatively affect 212 performance due to increased calls to the operating system's 213 memory manager, but may improve performance when accessing 214 a large number of large pack files. 215+ 216Default is 1 MiB if NO_MMAP was set at compile time, otherwise 32 217MiB on 32 bit platforms and 1 GiB on 64 bit platforms. This should 218be reasonable for all users/operating systems. You probably do 219not need to adjust this value. 220+ 221Common unit suffixes of 'k', 'm', or 'g' are supported. 222 223core.packedGitLimit:: 224 Maximum number of bytes to map simultaneously into memory 225 from pack files. If Git needs to access more than this many 226 bytes at once to complete an operation it will unmap existing 227 regions to reclaim virtual address space within the process. 228+ 229Default is 256 MiB on 32 bit platforms and 8 GiB on 64 bit platforms. 230This should be reasonable for all users/operating systems, except on 231the largest projects. You probably do not need to adjust this value. 232+ 233Common unit suffixes of 'k', 'm', or 'g' are supported. 234 235alias.*:: 236 Command aliases for the gitlink:git[1] command wrapper - e.g. 237 after defining "alias.last = cat-file commit HEAD", the invocation 238 "git last" is equivalent to "git cat-file commit HEAD". To avoid 239 confusion and troubles with script usage, aliases that 240 hide existing git commands are ignored. Arguments are split by 241 spaces, the usual shell quoting and escaping is supported. 242 quote pair and a backslash can be used to quote them. 243 244 If the alias expansion is prefixed with an exclamation point, 245 it will be treated as a shell command. For example, defining 246 "alias.new = !gitk --all --not ORIG_HEAD", the invocation 247 "git new" is equivalent to running the shell command 248 "gitk --all --not ORIG_HEAD". 249 250apply.whitespace:: 251 Tells `git-apply` how to handle whitespaces, in the same way 252 as the '--whitespace' option. See gitlink:git-apply[1]. 253 254branch.<name>.remote:: 255 When in branch <name>, it tells `git fetch` which remote to fetch. 256 If this option is not given, `git fetch` defaults to remote "origin". 257 258branch.<name>.merge:: 259 When in branch <name>, it tells `git fetch` the default refspec to 260 be marked for merging in FETCH_HEAD. The value has exactly to match 261 a remote part of one of the refspecs which are fetched from the remote 262 given by "branch.<name>.remote". 263 The merge information is used by `git pull` (which at first calls 264 `git fetch`) to lookup the default branch for merging. Without 265 this option, `git pull` defaults to merge the first refspec fetched. 266 Specify multiple values to get an octopus merge. 267 268color.branch:: 269 A boolean to enable/disable color in the output of 270 gitlink:git-branch[1]. May be set to `true` (or `always`), 271 `false` (or `never`) or `auto`, in which case colors are used 272 only when the output is to a terminal. Defaults to false. 273 274color.branch.<slot>:: 275 Use customized color for branch coloration. `<slot>` is one of 276 `current` (the current branch), `local` (a local branch), 277 `remote` (a tracking branch in refs/remotes/), `plain` (other 278 refs). 279+ 280The value for these configuration variables is a list of colors (at most 281two) and attributes (at most one), separated by spaces. The colors 282accepted are `normal`, `black`, `red`, `green`, `yellow`, `blue`, 283`magenta`, `cyan` and `white`; the attributes are `bold`, `dim`, `ul`, 284`blink` and `reverse`. The first color given is the foreground; the 285second is the background. The position of the attribute, if any, 286doesn't matter. 287 288color.diff:: 289 When true (or `always`), always use colors in patch. 290 When false (or `never`), never. When set to `auto`, use 291 colors only when the output is to the terminal. 292 293color.diff.<slot>:: 294 Use customized color for diff colorization. `<slot>` specifies 295 which part of the patch to use the specified color, and is one 296 of `plain` (context text), `meta` (metainformation), `frag` 297 (hunk header), `old` (removed lines), `new` (added lines), 298 `commit` (commit headers), or `whitespace` (highlighting dubious 299 whitespace). The values of these variables may be specified as 300 in color.branch.<slot>. 301 302color.pager:: 303 A boolean to enable/disable colored output when the pager is in 304 use (default is true). 305 306color.status:: 307 A boolean to enable/disable color in the output of 308 gitlink:git-status[1]. May be set to `true` (or `always`), 309 `false` (or `never`) or `auto`, in which case colors are used 310 only when the output is to a terminal. Defaults to false. 311 312color.status.<slot>:: 313 Use customized color for status colorization. `<slot>` is 314 one of `header` (the header text of the status message), 315 `added` or `updated` (files which are added but not committed), 316 `changed` (files which are changed but not added in the index), 317 or `untracked` (files which are not tracked by git). The values of 318 these variables may be specified as in color.branch.<slot>. 319 320diff.renameLimit:: 321 The number of files to consider when performing the copy/rename 322 detection; equivalent to the git diff option '-l'. 323 324diff.renames:: 325 Tells git to detect renames. If set to any boolean value, it 326 will enable basic rename detection. If set to "copies" or 327 "copy", it will detect copies, as well. 328 329fetch.unpackLimit:: 330 If the number of objects fetched over the git native 331 transfer is below this 332 limit, then the objects will be unpacked into loose object 333 files. However if the number of received objects equals or 334 exceeds this limit then the received pack will be stored as 335 a pack, after adding any missing delta bases. Storing the 336 pack from a push can make the push operation complete faster, 337 especially on slow filesystems. 338 339format.headers:: 340 Additional email headers to include in a patch to be submitted 341 by mail. See gitlink:git-format-patch[1]. 342 343format.suffix:: 344 The default for format-patch is to output files with the suffix 345 `.patch`. Use this variable to change that suffix (make sure to 346 include the dot if you want it). 347 348gc.packrefs:: 349 `git gc` does not run `git pack-refs` in a bare repository by 350 default so that older dumb-transport clients can still fetch 351 from the repository. Setting this to `true` lets `git 352 gc` to run `git pack-refs`. Setting this to `false` tells 353 `git gc` never to run `git pack-refs`. The default setting is 354 `notbare`. Enable it only when you know you do not have to 355 support such clients. The default setting will change to `true` 356 at some stage, and setting this to `false` will continue to 357 prevent `git pack-refs` from being run from `git gc`. 358 359gc.reflogexpire:: 360 `git reflog expire` removes reflog entries older than 361 this time; defaults to 90 days. 362 363gc.reflogexpireunreachable:: 364 `git reflog expire` removes reflog entries older than 365 this time and are not reachable from the current tip; 366 defaults to 30 days. 367 368gc.rerereresolved:: 369 Records of conflicted merge you resolved earlier are 370 kept for this many days when `git rerere gc` is run. 371 The default is 60 days. See gitlink:git-rerere[1]. 372 373gc.rerereunresolved:: 374 Records of conflicted merge you have not resolved are 375 kept for this many days when `git rerere gc` is run. 376 The default is 15 days. See gitlink:git-rerere[1]. 377 378gitcvs.enabled:: 379 Whether the cvs pserver interface is enabled for this repository. 380 See gitlink:git-cvsserver[1]. 381 382gitcvs.logfile:: 383 Path to a log file where the cvs pserver interface well... logs 384 various stuff. See gitlink:git-cvsserver[1]. 385 386http.sslVerify:: 387 Whether to verify the SSL certificate when fetching or pushing 388 over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY' environment 389 variable. 390 391http.sslCert:: 392 File containing the SSL certificate when fetching or pushing 393 over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_SSL_CERT' environment 394 variable. 395 396http.sslKey:: 397 File containing the SSL private key when fetching or pushing 398 over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_SSL_KEY' environment 399 variable. 400 401http.sslCAInfo:: 402 File containing the certificates to verify the peer with when 403 fetching or pushing over HTTPS. Can be overridden by the 404 'GIT_SSL_CAINFO' environment variable. 405 406http.sslCAPath:: 407 Path containing files with the CA certificates to verify the peer 408 with when fetching or pushing over HTTPS. Can be overridden 409 by the 'GIT_SSL_CAPATH' environment variable. 410 411http.maxRequests:: 412 How many HTTP requests to launch in parallel. Can be overridden 413 by the 'GIT_HTTP_MAX_REQUESTS' environment variable. Default is 5. 414 415http.lowSpeedLimit, http.lowSpeedTime:: 416 If the HTTP transfer speed is less than 'http.lowSpeedLimit' 417 for longer than 'http.lowSpeedTime' seconds, the transfer is aborted. 418 Can be overridden by the 'GIT_HTTP_LOW_SPEED_LIMIT' and 419 'GIT_HTTP_LOW_SPEED_TIME' environment variables. 420 421http.noEPSV:: 422 A boolean which disables using of EPSV ftp command by curl. 423 This can helpful with some "poor" ftp servers which doesn't 424 support EPSV mode. Can be overridden by the 'GIT_CURL_FTP_NO_EPSV' 425 environment variable. Default is false (curl will use EPSV). 426 427i18n.commitEncoding:: 428 Character encoding the commit messages are stored in; git itself 429 does not care per se, but this information is necessary e.g. when 430 importing commits from emails or in the gitk graphical history 431 browser (and possibly at other places in the future or in other 432 porcelains). See e.g. gitlink:git-mailinfo[1]. Defaults to 'utf-8'. 433 434i18n.logOutputEncoding:: 435 Character encoding the commit messages are converted to when 436 running `git-log` and friends. 437 438log.showroot:: 439 If true, the initial commit will be shown as a big creation event. 440 This is equivalent to a diff against an empty tree. 441 Tools like gitlink:git-log[1] or gitlink:git-whatchanged[1], which 442 normally hide the root commit will now show it. True by default. 443 444merge.summary:: 445 Whether to include summaries of merged commits in newly created 446 merge commit messages. False by default. 447 448merge.verbosity:: 449 Controls the amount of output shown by the recursive merge 450 strategy. Level 0 outputs nothing except a final error 451 message if conflicts were detected. Level 1 outputs only 452 conflicts, 2 outputs conflicts and file changes. Level 5 and 453 above outputs debugging information. The default is level 2. 454 455pack.window:: 456 The size of the window used by gitlink:git-pack-objects[1] when no 457 window size is given on the command line. Defaults to 10. 458 459pull.octopus:: 460 The default merge strategy to use when pulling multiple branches 461 at once. 462 463pull.twohead:: 464 The default merge strategy to use when pulling a single branch. 465 466remote.<name>.url:: 467 The URL of a remote repository. See gitlink:git-fetch[1] or 468 gitlink:git-push[1]. 469 470remote.<name>.fetch:: 471 The default set of "refspec" for gitlink:git-fetch[1]. See 472 gitlink:git-fetch[1]. 473 474remote.<name>.push:: 475 The default set of "refspec" for gitlink:git-push[1]. See 476 gitlink:git-push[1]. 477 478remote.<name>.receivepack:: 479 The default program to execute on the remote side when pushing. See 480 option \--exec of gitlink:git-push[1]. 481 482remote.<name>.uploadpack:: 483 The default program to execute on the remote side when fetching. See 484 option \--exec of gitlink:git-fetch-pack[1]. 485 486repack.usedeltabaseoffset:: 487 Allow gitlink:git-repack[1] to create packs that uses 488 delta-base offset. Defaults to false. 489 490show.difftree:: 491 The default gitlink:git-diff-tree[1] arguments to be used 492 for gitlink:git-show[1]. 493 494showbranch.default:: 495 The default set of branches for gitlink:git-show-branch[1]. 496 See gitlink:git-show-branch[1]. 497 498tar.umask:: 499 By default, gitlink:git-tar-tree[1] sets file and directories modes 500 to 0666 or 0777. While this is both useful and acceptable for projects 501 such as the Linux Kernel, it might be excessive for other projects. 502 With this variable, it becomes possible to tell 503 gitlink:git-tar-tree[1] to apply a specific umask to the modes above. 504 The special value "user" indicates that the user's current umask will 505 be used. This should be enough for most projects, as it will lead to 506 the same permissions as gitlink:git-checkout[1] would use. The default 507 value remains 0, which means world read-write. 508 509user.email:: 510 Your email address to be recorded in any newly created commits. 511 Can be overridden by the 'GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL' and 'GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL' 512 environment variables. See gitlink:git-commit-tree[1]. 513 514user.name:: 515 Your full name to be recorded in any newly created commits. 516 Can be overridden by the 'GIT_AUTHOR_NAME' and 'GIT_COMMITTER_NAME' 517 environment variables. See gitlink:git-commit-tree[1]. 518 519user.signingkey:: 520 If gitlink:git-tag[1] is not selecting the key you want it to 521 automatically when creating a signed tag, you can override the 522 default selection with this variable. This option is passed 523 unchanged to gpg's --local-user parameter, so you may specify a key 524 using any method that gpg supports. 525 526whatchanged.difftree:: 527 The default gitlink:git-diff-tree[1] arguments to be used 528 for gitlink:git-whatchanged[1]. 529 530imap:: 531 The configuration variables in the 'imap' section are described 532 in gitlink:git-imap-send[1]. 533 534receive.unpackLimit:: 535 If the number of objects received in a push is below this 536 limit then the objects will be unpacked into loose object 537 files. However if the number of received objects equals or 538 exceeds this limit then the received pack will be stored as 539 a pack, after adding any missing delta bases. Storing the 540 pack from a push can make the push operation complete faster, 541 especially on slow filesystems. 542 543receive.denyNonFastForwards:: 544 If set to true, git-receive-pack will deny a ref update which is 545 not a fast forward. Use this to prevent such an update via a push, 546 even if that push is forced. This configuration variable is 547 set when initializing a shared repository. 548 549transfer.unpackLimit:: 550 When `fetch.unpackLimit` or `receive.unpackLimit` are 551 not set, the value of this variable is used instead. 552 553