'\" t
.\"     Title: gitcli
.\"    Author: [FIXME: author] [see http://www.docbook.org/tdg5/en/html/author]
.\" Generator: DocBook XSL Stylesheets vsnapshot <http://docbook.sf.net/>
.\"      Date: 2025-11-17
.\"    Manual: Git Manual
.\"    Source: Git 2.52.0
.\"  Language: English
.\"
.TH "GITCLI" "7" "2025\-11\-17" "Git 2\&.52\&.0" "Git Manual"
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.SH "NAME"
gitcli \- Git command\-line interface and conventions
.SH "SYNOPSIS"
.sp
gitcli
.SH "DESCRIPTION"
.sp
This manual describes the convention used throughout Git CLI\&.
.sp
Many commands take revisions (most often "commits", but sometimes "tree\-ish", depending on the context and command) and paths as their arguments\&. Here are the rules:
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Options come first and then args\&. A subcommand may take dashed options (which may take their own arguments, e\&.g\&. "\-\-max\-parents 2") and arguments\&. You SHOULD give dashed options first and then arguments\&. Some commands may accept dashed options after you have already given non\-option arguments (which may make the command ambiguous), but you should not rely on it (because eventually we may find a way to fix these ambiguities by enforcing the "options then args" rule)\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Revisions come first and then paths\&. E\&.g\&. in
\fBgit\fR
\fBdiff\fR
\fBv1\&.0\fR
\fBv2\&.0\fR
\fBarch/x86\fR
\fBinclude/asm\-x86\fR,
\fBv1\&.0\fR
and
\fBv2\&.0\fR
are revisions and
\fBarch/x86\fR
and
\fBinclude/asm\-x86\fR
are paths\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
When an argument can be misunderstood as either a revision or a path, they can be disambiguated by placing
\fB\-\-\fR
between them\&. E\&.g\&.
\fBgit\fR
\fBdiff\fR
\fB\-\-\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
is, "I have a file called HEAD in my work tree\&. Please show changes between the version I staged in the index and what I have in the work tree for that file", not "show the difference between the HEAD commit and the work tree as a whole"\&. You can say
\fBgit\fR
\fBdiff\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
\fB\-\-\fR
to ask for the latter\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Without disambiguating
\fB\-\-\fR, Git makes a reasonable guess, but errors out and asks you to disambiguate when ambiguous\&. E\&.g\&. if you have a file called HEAD in your work tree,
\fBgit\fR
\fBdiff\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
is ambiguous, and you have to say either
\fBgit\fR
\fBdiff\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
\fB\-\-\fR
or
\fBgit\fR
\fBdiff\fR
\fB\-\-\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
to disambiguate\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Because
\fB\-\-\fR
disambiguates revisions and paths in some commands, it cannot be used for those commands to separate options and revisions\&. You can use
\fB\-\-end\-of\-options\fR
for this (it also works for commands that do not distinguish between revisions in paths, in which case it is simply an alias for
\fB\-\-\fR)\&.
.sp
When writing a script that is expected to handle random user\-input, it is a good practice to make it explicit which arguments are which by placing disambiguating
\fB\-\-\fR
at appropriate places\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Many commands allow wildcards in paths, but you need to protect them from getting globbed by the shell\&. These two mean different things:
.sp
.if n \{\
.RS 4
.\}
.nf
$ git restore *\&.c
$ git restore \e*\&.c
.fi
.if n \{\
.RE
.\}
.sp
The former lets your shell expand the fileglob, and you are asking the dot\-C files in your working tree to be overwritten with the version in the index\&. The latter passes the
\fB*\&.c\fR
to Git, and you are asking the paths in the index that match the pattern to be checked out to your working tree\&. After running
\fBgit\fR
\fBadd\fR
\fBhello\&.c\fR;
\fBrm\fR
\fBhello\&.c\fR, you will
\fInot\fR
see
\fBhello\&.c\fR
in your working tree with the former, but with the latter you will\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Just as the filesystem
\fI\&.\fR
(period) refers to the current directory, using a
\fI\&.\fR
as a repository name in Git (a dot\-repository) is a relative path and means your current repository\&.
.RE
.sp
Here are the rules regarding the "flags" that you should follow when you are scripting Git:
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Splitting short options to separate words (prefer
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-a\fR
\fB\-b\fR
to
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-ab\fR, the latter may not even work)\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
When a command\-line option takes an argument, use the
\fIstuck\fR
form\&. In other words, write
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-oArg\fR
instead of
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-o\fR
\fBArg\fR
for short options, and
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-\-long\-opt=Arg\fR
instead of
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-\-long\-opt\fR
\fBArg\fR
for long options\&. An option that takes optional option\-argument must be written in the
\fIstuck\fR
form\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Despite the above suggestion, when Arg is a path relative to the home directory of a user, e\&.g\&.
\fB~/directory/file\fR
or
\fB~u/d/f\fR, you may want to use the separate form, e\&.g\&.
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-\-file\fR
\fB~/mine\fR, not
\fBgit\fR
\fBfoo\fR
\fB\-\-file=~/mine\fR\&. The shell will expand
\fB~/\fR
in the former to your home directory, but most shells keep the tilde in the latter\&. Some of our commands know how to tilde\-expand the option value even when given in the stuck form, but not all of them do\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
When you give a revision parameter to a command, make sure the parameter is not ambiguous with a name of a file in the work tree\&. E\&.g\&. do not write
\fBgit\fR
\fBlog\fR
\fB\-1\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
but write
\fBgit\fR
\fBlog\fR
\fB\-1\fR
\fBHEAD\fR
\fB\-\-\fR; the former will not work if you happen to have a file called
\fBHEAD\fR
in the work tree\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
Many commands allow a long option
\fB\-\-option\fR
to be abbreviated only to their unique prefix (e\&.g\&. if there is no other option whose name begins with
\fBopt\fR, you may be able to spell
\fB\-\-opt\fR
to invoke the
\fB\-\-option\fR
flag), but you should fully spell them out when writing your scripts; later versions of Git may introduce a new option whose name shares the same prefix, e\&.g\&.
\fB\-\-optimize\fR, to make a short prefix that used to be unique no longer unique\&.
.RE
.SH "ENHANCED OPTION PARSER"
.sp
From the Git 1\&.5\&.4 series and further, many Git commands (not all of them at the time of the writing though) come with an enhanced option parser\&.
.sp
Here is a list of the facilities provided by this option parser\&.
.SS "Magic Options"
.sp
Commands which have the enhanced option parser activated all understand a couple of magic command\-line options:
.PP
\-h
.RS 4
gives a pretty printed usage of the command\&.
.sp
.if n \{\
.RS 4
.\}
.nf
$ git describe \-h
usage: git describe [<options>] <commit\-ish>*
   or: git describe [<options>] \-\-dirty

    \-\-contains            find the tag that comes after the commit
    \-\-debug               debug search strategy on stderr
    \-\-all                 use any ref
    \-\-tags                use any tag, even unannotated
    \-\-long                always use long format
    \-\-abbrev[=<n>]        use <n> digits to display SHA\-1s
.fi
.if n \{\
.RE
.\}
.sp
Note that some subcommand (e\&.g\&.
\fBgit\fR
\fBgrep\fR) may behave differently when there are things on the command line other than
\fB\-h\fR, but
\fBgit\fR
\fBsubcmd\fR
\fB\-h\fR
without anything else on the command line is meant to consistently give the usage\&.
.RE
.PP
\-\-help\-all
.RS 4
Some Git commands take options that are only used for plumbing or that are deprecated, and such options are hidden from the default usage\&. This option gives the full list of options\&.
.RE
.SS "Negating options"
.sp
Options with long option names can be negated by prefixing \fB\-\-no\-\fR\&. For example, \fBgit\fR \fBbranch\fR has the option \fB\-\-track\fR which is \fIon\fR by default\&. You can use \fB\-\-no\-track\fR to override that behaviour\&. The same goes for \fB\-\-color\fR and \fB\-\-no\-color\fR\&.
.SS "Options trump configuration and environment"
.sp
When there is a configuration variable or an environment variable that tweak the behaviour of an aspect of a Git command, and also a command line option that tweaks the same, the command line option overrides what the configuration and/or environment variable say\&.
.sp
For example, the \fBuser\&.name\fR configuration variable is used to specify the human\-readable name used by the \fBgit\fR \fBcommit\fR command to record the author and the committer name in a newly created commit\&. The \fBGIT_AUTHOR_NAME\fR environment variable, if set, takes precedence when deciding what author name to record\&. The \fB\-\-author=\fR\fI<author>\fR command line option of the \fBgit\fR \fBcommit\fR command, when given, takes precedence over these two sources of information\&.
.SS "Aggregating short options"
.sp
Commands that support the enhanced option parser allow you to aggregate short options\&. This means that you can for example use \fBgit\fR \fBrm\fR \fB\-rf\fR or \fBgit\fR \fBclean\fR \fB\-fdx\fR\&.
.SS "Abbreviating long options"
.sp
Commands that support the enhanced option parser accepts unique prefix of a long option as if it is fully spelled out, but use this with a caution\&. For example, \fBgit\fR \fBcommit\fR \fB\-\-amen\fR behaves as if you typed \fBgit\fR \fBcommit\fR \fB\-\-amend\fR, but that is true only until a later version of Git introduces another option that shares the same prefix, e\&.g\&. \fBgit\fR \fBcommit\fR \fB\-\-amenity\fR option\&.
.SS "Separating argument from the option"
.sp
You can write the mandatory option parameter to an option as a separate word on the command line\&. That means that all the following uses work:
.sp
.if n \{\
.RS 4
.\}
.nf
$ git foo \-\-long\-opt=Arg
$ git foo \-\-long\-opt Arg
$ git foo \-oArg
$ git foo \-o Arg
.fi
.if n \{\
.RE
.\}
.sp
.sp
However, this is \fBNOT\fR allowed for switches with an optional value, where the \fIstuck\fR form must be used:
.sp
.if n \{\
.RS 4
.\}
.nf
$ git describe \-\-abbrev HEAD     # correct
$ git describe \-\-abbrev=10 HEAD  # correct
$ git describe \-\-abbrev 10 HEAD  # NOT WHAT YOU MEANT
.fi
.if n \{\
.RE
.\}
.sp
.SS "Magic filename options"
.sp
Options that take a filename allow a prefix \fB:\fR(\fBoptional\fR)\&. For example:
.sp
.if n \{\
.RS 4
.\}
.nf
git commit \-F :(optional)COMMIT_EDITMSG
# if COMMIT_EDITMSG does not exist, the above is equivalent to
git commit
.fi
.if n \{\
.RE
.\}
.sp
.sp
Like with configuration values, if the named file is missing Git behaves as if the option was not given at all\&. See "Values" in \fBgit-config\fR(1)\&.
.SH "NOTES ON FREQUENTLY CONFUSED OPTIONS"
.sp
Many commands that can work on files in the working tree and/or in the index can take \fB\-\-cached\fR and/or \fB\-\-index\fR options\&. Sometimes people incorrectly think that, because the index was originally called cache, these two are synonyms\&. They are \fBnot\fR \(em these two options mean very different things\&.
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
The
\fB\-\-cached\fR
option is used to ask a command that usually works on files in the working tree to
\fBonly\fR
work with the index\&. For example,
\fBgit\fR
\fBgrep\fR, when used without a commit to specify from which commit to look for strings in, usually works on files in the working tree, but with the
\fB\-\-cached\fR
option, it looks for strings in the index\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
The
\fB\-\-index\fR
option is used to ask a command that usually works on files in the working tree to
\fBalso\fR
affect the index\&. For example,
\fBgit\fR
\fBstash\fR
\fBapply\fR
usually merges changes recorded in a stash entry to the working tree, but with the
\fB\-\-index\fR
option, it also merges changes to the index as well\&.
.RE
.sp
\fBgit\fR \fBapply\fR command can be used with \fB\-\-cached\fR and \fB\-\-index\fR (but not at the same time)\&. Usually the command only affects the files in the working tree, but with \fB\-\-index\fR, it patches both the files and their index entries, and with \fB\-\-cached\fR, it modifies only the index entries\&.
.sp
See also \m[blue]\fBhttps://lore\&.kernel\&.org/git/7v64clg5u9\&.fsf@assigned\-by\-dhcp\&.cox\&.net/\fR\m[] and \m[blue]\fBhttps://lore\&.kernel\&.org/git/7vy7ej9g38\&.fsf@gitster\&.siamese\&.dyndns\&.org/\fR\m[] for further information\&.
.sp
Some other commands that also work on files in the working tree and/or in the index can take \fB\-\-staged\fR and/or \fB\-\-worktree\fR\&.
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
\fB\-\-staged\fR
is exactly like
\fB\-\-cached\fR, which is used to ask a command to only work on the index, not the working tree\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
\fB\-\-worktree\fR
is the opposite, to ask a command to work on the working tree only, not the index\&.
.RE
.sp
.RS 4
.ie n \{\
\h'-04'\(bu\h'+03'\c
.\}
.el \{\
.sp -1
.IP \(bu 2.3
.\}
The two options can be specified together to ask a command to work on both the index and the working tree\&.
.RE
.SH "GIT"
.sp
Part of the \fBgit\fR(1) suite