GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)NAMEgit-format-patch - Prepare patches for e-mail submission
SYNOPSIS
git format-patch [-k] [(-o|--output-directory) <dir> | --stdout]
[--no-thread | --thread[=<style>]]
[(--attach|--inline)[=<boundary>] | --no-attach]
[-s | --signoff]
[--signature=<signature> | --no-signature]
[-n | --numbered | -N | --no-numbered]
[--start-number <n>] [--numbered-files]
[--in-reply-to=Message-Id] [--suffix=.<sfx>]
[--ignore-if-in-upstream]
[--subject-prefix=Subject-Prefix]
[--to=<email>] [--cc=<email>]
[--cover-letter]
[<common diff options>]
[ <since> | <revision range> ]
DESCRIPTION
Prepare each commit with its patch in one file per commit, formatted to
resemble UNIX mailbox format. The output of this command is convenient
for e-mail submission or for use with git am.
There are two ways to specify which commits to operate on.
1. A single commit, <since>, specifies that the commits leading to the
tip of the current branch that are not in the history that leads to
the <since> to be output.
2. Generic <revision range> expression (see "SPECIFYING REVISIONS" sec-
tion in gitrevisions(7)) means the commits in the specified range.
The first rule takes precedence in the case of a single <commit>. To
apply the second rule, i.e., format everything since the beginning of
history up until <commit>, use the --root option: git format-patch
\--root <commit>. If you want to format only <commit> itself, you can
do this with git format-patch -1 <commit>.
By default, each output file is numbered sequentially from 1, and uses
the first line of the commit message (massaged for pathname safety) as
the filename. With the --numbered-files option, the output file names
will only be numbers, without the first line of the commit appended.
The names of the output files are printed to standard output, unless
the --stdout option is specified.
If -o is specified, output files are created in <dir>. Otherwise they
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GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)
are created in the current working directory.
By default, the subject of a single patch is "[PATCH] First Line" and
the subject when multiple patches are output is "[PATCH n/m] First
Line". To force 1/1 to be added for a single patch, use -n. To omit
patch numbers from the subject, use -N.
If given --thread, git-format-patch will generate In-Reply-To and Ref-
erences headers to make the second and subsequent patch mails appear as
replies to the first mail; this also generates a Message-Id header to
reference.
OPTIONS-p, --no-stat
Generate plain patches without any diffstats.
-U<n>, --unified=<n>
Generate diffs with <n> lines of context instead of the usual
three.
--patience
Generate a diff using the "patience diff" algorithm.
--stat[=<width>[,<name-width>]]
Generate a diffstat. You can override the default output width
for 80-column terminal by --stat=<width>. The width of the file-
name part can be controlled by giving another width to it sepa-
rated by a comma.
--numstat
Similar to \--stat, but shows number of added and deleted lines
in decimal notation and pathname without abbreviation, to make
it more machine friendly. For binary files, outputs two -
instead of saying 0 0.
--shortstat
Output only the last line of the --stat format containing total
number of modified files, as well as number of added and deleted
lines.
--dirstat[=<limit>]
Output the distribution of relative amount of changes (number of
lines added or removed) for each sub-directory. Directories with
changes below a cut-off percent (3% by default) are not shown.
The cut-off percent can be set with --dirstat=<limit>. Changes
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in a child directory are not counted for the parent directory,
unless --cumulative is used.
--dirstat-by-file[=<limit>]
Same as --dirstat, but counts changed files instead of lines.
--summary
Output a condensed summary of extended header information such
as creations, renames and mode changes.
--no-renames
Turn off rename detection, even when the configuration file
gives the default to do so.
--full-index
Instead of the first handful of characters, show the full pre-
and post-image blob object names on the "index" line when gener-
ating patch format output.
--binary
In addition to --full-index, output a binary diff that can be
applied with git-apply.
--abbrev[=<n>]
Instead of showing the full 40-byte hexadecimal object name in
diff-raw format output and diff-tree header lines, show only a
partial prefix. This is independent of the --full-index option
above, which controls the diff-patch output format. Non default
number of digits can be specified with --abbrev=<n>.
-B[<n>][/<m>]
Break complete rewrite changes into pairs of delete and create.
This serves two purposes:
It affects the way a change that amounts to a total rewrite of a
file not as a series of deletion and insertion mixed together
with a very few lines that happen to match textually as the con-
text, but as a single deletion of everything old followed by a
single insertion of everything new, and the number m controls
this aspect of the -B option (defaults to 60%). -B/70% specifies
that less than 30% of the original should remain in the result
for git to consider it a total rewrite (i.e. otherwise the
resulting patch will be a series of deletion and insertion mixed
together with context lines).
When used with -M, a totally-rewritten file is also considered
as the source of a rename (usually -M only considers a file that
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disappeared as the source of a rename), and the number n con-
trols this aspect of the -B option (defaults to 50%). -B20%
specifies that a change with addition and deletion compared to
20% or more of the file’s size are eligible for being
picked up as a possible source of a rename to another file.
-M[<n>]
Detect renames. If n is specified, it is a is a threshold on the
similarity index (i.e. amount of addition/deletions compared to
the file’s size). For example, -M90% means git should con-
sider a delete/add pair to be a rename if more than 90% of the
file hasn’t changed.
-C[<n>]
Detect copies as well as renames. See also --find-copies-harder.
If n is specified, it has the same meaning as for -M<n>.
--find-copies-harder
For performance reasons, by default, -C option finds copies only
if the original file of the copy was modified in the same
changeset. This flag makes the command inspect unmodified files
as candidates for the source of copy. This is a very expensive
operation for large projects, so use it with caution. Giving
more than one -C option has the same effect.
-l<num>
The -M and -C options require O(n^2) processing time where n is
the number of potential rename/copy targets. This option pre-
vents rename/copy detection from running if the number of
rename/copy targets exceeds the specified number.
-O<orderfile>
Output the patch in the order specified in the <orderfile>,
which has one shell glob pattern per line.
-a, --text
Treat all files as text.
--ignore-space-at-eol
Ignore changes in whitespace at EOL.
-b, --ignore-space-change
Ignore changes in amount of whitespace. This ignores whitespace
at line end, and considers all other sequences of one or more
whitespace characters to be equivalent.
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GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)-w, --ignore-all-space
Ignore whitespace when comparing lines. This ignores differences
even if one line has whitespace where the other line has none.
--inter-hunk-context=<lines>
Show the context between diff hunks, up to the specified number
of lines, thereby fusing hunks that are close to each other.
--ext-diff
Allow an external diff helper to be executed. If you set an
external diff driver with gitattributes(5), you need to use this
option with git-log(1) and friends.
--no-ext-diff
Disallow external diff drivers.
--ignore-submodules[=<when>]
Ignore changes to submodules in the diff generation. <when> can
be either "none", "untracked", "dirty" or "all", which is the
default Using "none" will consider the submodule modified when
it either contains untracked or modified files or its HEAD dif-
fers from the commit recorded in the superproject and can be
used to override any settings of the ignore option in git-con-
fig(1) or gitmodules(5). When "untracked" is used submodules are
not considered dirty when they only contain untracked content
(but they are still scanned for modified content). Using "dirty"
ignores all changes to the work tree of submodules, only changes
to the commits stored in the superproject are shown (this was
the behavior until 1.7.0). Using "all" hides all changes to sub-
modules.
--src-prefix=<prefix>
Show the given source prefix instead of "a/".
--dst-prefix=<prefix>
Show the given destination prefix instead of "b/".
--no-prefix
Do not show any source or destination prefix.
For more detailed explanation on these common options, see also
gitdiffcore(7).
-<n> Limits the number of patches to prepare.
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GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)-o <dir>, --output-directory <dir>
Use <dir> to store the resulting files, instead of the current
working directory.
-n, --numbered
Name output in [PATCH n/m] format, even with a single patch.
-N, --no-numbered
Name output in [PATCH] format.
--start-number <n>
Start numbering the patches at <n> instead of 1.
--numbered-files
Output file names will be a simple number sequence without the
default first line of the commit appended.
-k, --keep-subject
Do not strip/add [PATCH] from the first line of the commit log
message.
-s, --signoff
Add Signed-off-by: line to the commit message, using the commit-
ter identity of yourself.
--stdout
Print all commits to the standard output in mbox format, instead
of creating a file for each one.
--attach[=<boundary>]
Create multipart/mixed attachment, the first part of which is
the commit message and the patch itself in the second part, with
Content-Disposition: attachment.
--no-attach
Disable the creation of an attachment, overriding the configura-
tion setting.
--inline[=<boundary>]
Create multipart/mixed attachment, the first part of which is
the commit message and the patch itself in the second part, with
Content-Disposition: inline.
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--thread[=<style>], --no-thread
Controls addition of In-Reply-To and References headers to make
the second and subsequent mails appear as replies to the first.
Also controls generation of the Message-Id header to reference.
The optional <style> argument can be either shallow or deep.
shallow threading makes every mail a reply to the head of the
series, where the head is chosen from the cover letter, the
\--in-reply-to, and the first patch mail, in this order. deep
threading makes every mail a reply to the previous one.
The default is --no-thread, unless the format.thread configura-
tion is set. If --thread is specified without a style, it
defaults to the style specified by format.thread if any, or else
shallow.
Beware that the default for git send-email is to thread emails
itself. If you want git format-patch to take care of threading,
you will want to ensure that threading is disabled for git
send-email.
--in-reply-to=Message-Id
Make the first mail (or all the mails with --no-thread) appear
as a reply to the given Message-Id, which avoids breaking
threads to provide a new patch series.
--ignore-if-in-upstream
Do not include a patch that matches a commit in
<until>..<since>. This will examine all patches reachable from
<since> but not from <until> and compare them with the patches
being generated, and any patch that matches is ignored.
--subject-prefix=<Subject-Prefix>
Instead of the standard [PATCH] prefix in the subject line,
instead use [<Subject-Prefix>]. This allows for useful naming of
a patch series, and can be combined with the --numbered option.
--to=<email>
Add a To: header to the email headers. This is in addition to
any configured headers, and may be used multiple times.
--cc=<email>
Add a Cc: header to the email headers. This is in addition to
any configured headers, and may be used multiple times.
--add-header=<header>
Add an arbitrary header to the email headers. This is in addi-
tion to any configured headers, and may be used multiple times.
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GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)GIT-FORMAT-PATCH(1)
For example, --add-header="Organization: git-foo"
--cover-letter
In addition to the patches, generate a cover letter file con-
taining the shortlog and the overall diffstat. You can fill in a
description in the file before sending it out.
--[no]-signature=<signature>
Add a signature to each message produced. Per RFC 3676 the sig-
nature is separated from the body by a line with '-- ' on it. If
the signature option is omitted the signature defaults to the
git version number.
--suffix=.<sfx>
Instead of using .patch as the suffix for generated filenames,
use specified suffix. A common alternative is --suffix=.txt.
Leaving this empty will remove the .patch suffix.
Note that the leading character does not have to be a dot; for
example, you can use --suffix=-patch to get 0001-descrip-
tion-of-my-change-patch.
--no-binary
Do not output contents of changes in binary files, instead dis-
play a notice that those files changed. Patches generated using
this option cannot be applied properly, but they are still use-
ful for code review.
--root Treat the revision argument as a <revision range>, even if it is
just a single commit (that would normally be treated as a
<since>). Note that root commits included in the specified range
are always formatted as creation patches, independently of this
flag.
CONFIGURATION
You can specify extra mail header lines to be added to each message,
defaults for the subject prefix and file suffix, number patches when
outputting more than one patch, add "To" or "Cc:" headers, configure
attachments, and sign off patches with configuration variables.
.ft C
[format]
headers = "Organization: git-foo\n"
subjectprefix = CHANGE
suffix = .txt
numbered = auto
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to = <email>
cc = <email>
attach [ = mime-boundary-string ]
signoff = true
.ft
EXAMPLES
o Extract commits between revisions R1 and R2, and apply them on top
of the current branch using git am to cherry-pick them:
.ft C
$ git format-patch -k --stdout R1..R2 | git am -3 -k
.ft
o Extract all commits which are in the current branch but not in the
origin branch:
.ft C
$ git format-patch origin
.ft
For each commit a separate file is created in the current directory.
o Extract all commits that lead to origin since the inception of the
project:
.ft C
$ git format-patch --root origin
.ft
o The same as the previous one:
.ft C
$ git format-patch -M -B origin
.ft
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Additionally, it detects and handles renames and complete rewrites
intelligently to produce a renaming patch. A renaming patch reduces
the amount of text output, and generally makes it easier to review.
Note that non-git "patch" programs won’t understand renaming
patches, so use it only when you know the recipient uses git to
apply your patch.
o Extract three topmost commits from the current branch and format
them as e-mailable patches:
.ft C
$ git format-patch -3
.ft
SEE ALSOgit-am(1), git-send-email(1)AUTHOR
Written by Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com: mailto:gitster@pobox.com>
DOCUMENTATION
Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org:
mailto:git@vger.kernel.org>.
GIT
Part of the git(1) suite
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