GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)NAMEgit-commit - Record changes to the repository
SYNOPSIS
git commit [-a | --interactive] [-s] [-v] [-u<mode>] [--amend] [--dry-run]
[(-c | -C) <commit>] [-F <file> | -m <msg>] [--reset-author]
[--allow-empty] [--allow-empty-message] [--no-verify] [-e] [--author=<author>]
[--date=<date>] [--cleanup=<mode>] [--status | --no-status]
[-i | -o] [--] [<file>...]
DESCRIPTION
Stores the current contents of the index in a new commit along with a
log message from the user describing the changes.
The content to be added can be specified in several ways:
1. by using git add to incrementally "add" changes to the index before
using the commit command (Note: even modified files must be
"added");
2. by using git rm to remove files from the working tree and the index,
again before using the commit command;
3. by listing files as arguments to the commit command, in which case
the commit will ignore changes staged in the index, and instead
record the current content of the listed files (which must already
be known to git);
4. by using the -a switch with the commit command to automatically
"add" changes from all known files (i.e. all files that are already
listed in the index) and to automatically "rm" files in the index
that have been removed from the working tree, and then perform the
actual commit;
5. by using the --interactive switch with the commit command to decide
one by one which files should be part of the commit, before finaliz-
ing the operation. Currently, this is done by invoking git add
--interactive.
The --dry-run option can be used to obtain a summary of what is
included by any of the above for the next commit by giving the same set
of parameters (options and paths).
If you make a commit and then find a mistake immediately after that,
you can recover from it with git reset.
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)OPTIONS-a, --all
Tell the command to automatically stage files that have been
modified and deleted, but new files you have not told git about
are not affected.
-C <commit>, --reuse-message=<commit>
Take an existing commit object, and reuse the log message and
the authorship information (including the timestamp) when creat-
ing the commit.
-c <commit>, --reedit-message=<commit>
Like -C, but with -c the editor is invoked, so that the user can
further edit the commit message.
--reset-author
When used with -C/-c/--amend options, declare that the author-
ship of the resulting commit now belongs of the committer. This
also renews the author timestamp.
--short
When doing a dry-run, give the output in the short-format. See
git-status(1) for details. Implies --dry-run.
--porcelain
When doing a dry-run, give the output in a porcelain-ready for-
mat. See git-status(1) for details. Implies --dry-run.
-z When showing short or porcelain status output, terminate entries
in the status output with NUL, instead of LF. If no format is
given, implies the --porcelain output format.
-F <file>, --file=<file>
Take the commit message from the given file. Use - to read the
message from the standard input.
--author=<author>
Override the commit author. Specify an explicit author using the
standard A U Thor <author@example.com> format. Otherwise
<author> is assumed to be a pattern and is used to search for an
existing commit by that author (i.e. rev-list --all-i
--author=<author>); the commit author is then copied from the
first such commit found.
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
--date=<date>
Override the author date used in the commit.
-m <msg>, --message=<msg>
Use the given <msg> as the commit message.
-t <file>, --template=<file>
Use the contents of the given file as the initial version of the
commit message. The editor is invoked and you can make subse-
quent changes. If a message is specified using the -m or -F
options, this option has no effect. This overrides the com-
mit.template configuration variable.
-s, --signoff
Add Signed-off-by line by the committer at the end of the commit
log message.
-n, --no-verify
This option bypasses the pre-commit and commit-msg hooks. See
also githooks(5).
--allow-empty
Usually recording a commit that has the exact same tree as its
sole parent commit is a mistake, and the command prevents you
from making such a commit. This option bypasses the safety, and
is primarily for use by foreign SCM interface scripts.
--allow-empty-message
Like --allow-empty this command is primarily for use by foreign
SCM interface scripts. It allows you to create a commit with an
empty commit message without using plumbing commands like
git-commit-tree(1).
--cleanup=<mode>
This option sets how the commit message is cleaned up. The
<mode> can be one of verbatim, whitespace, strip, and default.
The default mode will strip leading and trailing empty lines and
#commentary from the commit message only if the message is to be
edited. Otherwise only whitespace removed. The verbatim mode
does not change message at all, whitespace removes just lead-
ing/trailing whitespace lines and strip removes both whitespace
and commentary.
-e, --edit
The message taken from file with -F, command line with -m, and
from file with -C are usually used as the commit log message
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
unmodified. This option lets you further edit the message taken
from these sources.
--amend
Used to amend the tip of the current branch. Prepare the tree
object you would want to replace the latest commit as usual
(this includes the usual -i/-o and explicit paths), and the com-
mit log editor is seeded with the commit message from the tip of
the current branch. The commit you create replaces the current
tip -- if it was a merge, it will have the parents
of the current tip as parents -- so the current top
commit is discarded.
It is a rough equivalent for:
.ft C
$ git reset --soft HEAD^
$ ... do something else to come up with the right tree ...
$ git commit -c ORIG_HEAD
.ft
but can be used to amend a merge commit.
You should understand the implications of rewriting history if
you amend a commit that has already been published. (See the
"RECOVERING FROM UPSTREAM REBASE" section in git-rebase(1).)
-i, --include
Before making a commit out of staged contents so far, stage the
contents of paths given on the command line as well. This is
usually not what you want unless you are concluding a conflicted
merge.
-o, --only
Make a commit only from the paths specified on the command line,
disregarding any contents that have been staged so far. This is
the default mode of operation of git commit if any paths are
given on the command line, in which case this option can be
omitted. If this option is specified together with --amend, then
no paths need to be specified, which can be used to amend the
last commit without committing changes that have already been
staged.
-u[<mode>], --untracked-files[=<mode>]
Show untracked files (Default: all).
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
The mode parameter is optional, and is used to specify the han-
dling of untracked files.
The possible options are:
o no - Show no untracked files
o normal - Shows untracked files and directories
o all - Also shows individual files in untracked directories.
See git-config(1) for configuration variable used to change
the default for when the option is not specified.
-v, --verbose
Show unified diff between the HEAD commit and what would be com-
mitted at the bottom of the commit message template. Note that
this diff output doesn’t have its lines prefixed with #.
-q, --quiet
Suppress commit summary message.
--dry-run
Do not create a commit, but show a list of paths that are to be
committed, paths with local changes that will be left uncommit-
ted and paths that are untracked.
--status
Include the output of git-status(1) in the commit message tem-
plate when using an editor to prepare the commit message.
Defaults to on, but can be used to override configuration vari-
able commit.status.
--no-status
Do not include the output of git-status(1) in the commit message
template when using an editor to prepare the default commit mes-
sage.
-- Do not interpret any more arguments as options.
<file>...
When files are given on the command line, the command commits
the contents of the named files, without recording the changes
already staged. The contents of these files are also staged for
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
the next commit on top of what have been staged before.
DATE FORMATS
The GIT_AUTHOR_DATE, GIT_COMMITTER_DATE environment variables and the
--date option support the following date formats:
Git internal format
It is <unix timestamp> <timezone offset>, where <unix timestamp>
is the number of seconds since the UNIX epoch. <timezone offset>
is a positive or negative offset from UTC. For example CET
(which is 2 hours ahead UTC) is +0200.
RFC 2822
The standard email format as described by RFC 2822, for example
Thu, 07 Apr 2005 22:13:13 +0200.
ISO 8601
Time and date specified by the ISO 8601 standard, for example
2005-04-07T22:13:13. The parser accepts a space instead of the T
character as well.
Note
In addition, the date part is accepted in the following formats:
YYYY.MM.DD, MM/DD/YYYY and DD.MM.YYYY.
EXAMPLES
When recording your own work, the contents of modified files in your
working tree are temporarily stored to a staging area called the
"index" with git add. A file can be reverted back, only in the index
but not in the working tree, to that of the last commit with git reset
HEAD -- <file>, which effectively reverts git add and prevents the
changes to this file from participating in the next commit. After
building the state to be committed incrementally with these commands,
git commit (without any pathname parameter) is used to record what has
been staged so far. This is the most basic form of the command. An
example:
.ft C
$ edit hello.c
$ git rm goodbye.c
$ git add hello.c
$ git commit
.ft
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
Instead of staging files after each individual change, you can tell git
commit to notice the changes to the files whose contents are tracked in
your working tree and do corresponding git add and git rm for you. That
is, this example does the same as the earlier example if there is no
other change in your working tree:
.ft C
$ edit hello.c
$ rm goodbye.c
$ git commit -a
.ft
The command git commit -a first looks at your working tree, notices
that you have modified hello.c and removed goodbye.c, and performs nec-
essary git add and git rm for you.
After staging changes to many files, you can alter the order the
changes are recorded in, by giving pathnames to git commit. When path-
names are given, the command makes a commit that only records the
changes made to the named paths:
.ft C
$ edit hello.c hello.h
$ git add hello.c hello.h
$ edit Makefile
$ git commit Makefile
.ft
This makes a commit that records the modification to Makefile. The
changes staged for hello.c and hello.h are not included in the result-
ing commit. However, their changes are not lost -- they are
still staged and merely held back. After the above sequence, if you do:
.ft C
$ git commit
.ft
this second commit would record the changes to hello.c and hello.h as
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
expected.
After a merge (initiated by git merge or git pull) stops because of
conflicts, cleanly merged paths are already staged to be committed for
you, and paths that conflicted are left in unmerged state. You would
have to first check which paths are conflicting with git status and
after fixing them manually in your working tree, you would stage the
result as usual with git add:
.ft C
$ git status | grep unmerged
unmerged: hello.c
$ edit hello.c
$ git add hello.c
.ft
After resolving conflicts and staging the result, git ls-files -u would
stop mentioning the conflicted path. When you are done, run git commit
to finally record the merge:
.ft C
$ git commit
.ft
As with the case to record your own changes, you can use -a option to
save typing. One difference is that during a merge resolution, you can-
not use git commit with pathnames to alter the order the changes are
committed, because the merge should be recorded as a single commit. In
fact, the command refuses to run when given pathnames (but see -i
option).
DISCUSSION
Though not required, it’s a good idea to begin the commit message
with a single short (less than 50 character) line summarizing the
change, followed by a blank line and then a more thorough description.
Tools that turn commits into email, for example, use the first line on
the Subject: line and the rest of the commit in the body.
At the core level, git is character encoding agnostic.
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
o The pathnames recorded in the index and in the tree objects are
treated as uninterpreted sequences of non-NUL bytes. What readdir(2)
returns are what are recorded and compared with the data git keeps
track of, which in turn are expected to be what lstat(2) and
creat(2) accepts. There is no such thing as pathname encoding trans-
lation.
o The contents of the blob objects are uninterpreted sequences of
bytes. There is no encoding translation at the core level.
o The commit log messages are uninterpreted sequences of non-NUL
bytes.
Although we encourage that the commit log messages are encoded in
UTF-8, both the core and git Porcelain are designed not to force UTF-8
on projects. If all participants of a particular project find it more
convenient to use legacy encodings, git does not forbid it. However,
there are a few things to keep in mind.
1. git commit and git commit-tree issues a warning if the commit log
message given to it does not look like a valid UTF-8 string, unless
you explicitly say your project uses a legacy encoding. The way to
say this is to have i18n.commitencoding in .git/config file, like
this:
.ft C
[i18n]
commitencoding = ISO-8859-1
.ft
Commit objects created with the above setting record the value of
i18n.commitencoding in its encoding header. This is to help other
people who look at them later. Lack of this header implies that the
commit log message is encoded in UTF-8.
2. git log, git show, git blame and friends look at the encoding
header of a commit object, and try to re-code the log message into
UTF-8 unless otherwise specified. You can specify the desired output
encoding with i18n.logoutputencoding in .git/config file, like this:
.ft C
[i18n]
logoutputencoding = ISO-8859-1
.ft
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GIT-COMMIT(1)GIT-COMMIT(1)
If you do not have this configuration variable, the value of
i18n.commitencoding is used instead.
Note that we deliberately chose not to re-code the commit log message
when a commit is made to force UTF-8 at the commit object level,
because re-coding to UTF-8 is not necessarily a reversible operation.
ENVIRONMENT AND CONFIGURATION VARIABLES
The editor used to edit the commit log message will be chosen from the
GIT_EDITOR environment variable, the core.editor configuration vari-
able, the VISUAL environment variable, or the EDITOR environment vari-
able (in that order). See git-var(1) for details.
HOOKS
This command can run commit-msg, prepare-commit-msg, pre-commit, and
post-commit hooks. See githooks(5) for more information.
SEE ALSOgit-add(1), git-rm(1), git-mv(1), git-merge(1), git-commit-tree(1)AUTHOR
Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org: mailto:torvalds@osdl.org>
and Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com: mailto:gitster@pobox.com>
GIT
Part of the git(1) suite
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