git-format-patch.html - external/gitster/git-htmldocs - Git at Google

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 </style>
 <title>git-format-patch(1)</title>
 </head>
 <body>
 <div id="header">
 <h1>
 git-format-patch(1) Manual Page
 </h1>
 <h2>NAME</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <p>git-format-patch -
  Prepare patches for e-mail submission
 </p>
 </div>
 </div>
 <h2>SYNOPSIS</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="verseblock">
 <div class="content"><em>git format-patch</em> [-k] [(-o|--output-directory) &lt;dir&gt; | --stdout]
  [--thread[=&lt;style&gt;]]
  [(--attach|--inline)[=&lt;boundary&gt;] | --no-attach]
  [-s | --signoff]
  [-n | --numbered | -N | --no-numbered]
  [--start-number &lt;n&gt;] [--numbered-files]
  [--in-reply-to=Message-Id] [--suffix=.&lt;sfx&gt;]
  [--ignore-if-in-upstream]
  [--subject-prefix=Subject-Prefix]
  [--cc=&lt;email&gt;]
  [--cover-letter]
  [&lt;common diff options&gt;]
  [ &lt;since&gt; | &lt;revision range&gt; ]</div></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_description">DESCRIPTION</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="para"><p>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 <em>git-am</em>.</p></div>
 <div class="para"><p>There are two ways to specify which commits to operate on.</p></div>
 <div class="olist"><ol>
 <li>
 <p>
 A single commit, &lt;since&gt;, specifies that the commits leading
  to the tip of the current branch that are not in the history
  that leads to the &lt;since&gt; to be output.
 </p>
 </li>
 <li>
 <p>
 Generic &lt;revision range&gt; expression (see "SPECIFYING
  REVISIONS" section in <a href="git-rev-parse.html">git-rev-parse(1)</a>) means the
  commits in the specified range.
 </p>
 </li>
 </ol></div>
 <div class="para"><p>The first rule takes precedence in the case of a single &lt;commit&gt;. To
 apply the second rule, i.e., format everything since the beginning of
 history up until &lt;commit&gt;, use the <em>--root</em> option: "git format-patch
 --root &lt;commit&gt;". If you want to format only &lt;commit&gt; itself, you
 can do this with "git format-patch -1 &lt;commit&gt;".</p></div>
 <div class="para"><p>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.</p></div>
 <div class="para"><p>If -o is specified, output files are created in &lt;dir&gt;. Otherwise
 they are created in the current working directory.</p></div>
 <div class="para"><p>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</p></div>
 <div class="para"><p>If given --thread, <em>git-format-patch</em> will generate In-Reply-To and
 References 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.</p></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_options">OPTIONS</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="vlist"><dl>
 <dt>
 -p
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Generate patches without diffstat.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -U&lt;n&gt;
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --unified=&lt;n&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Generate diffs with &lt;n&gt; lines of context instead of
  the usual three. Implies "-p".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --raw
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Generate the raw format.

 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --patch-with-raw
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Synonym for "-p --raw".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --patience
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Generate a diff using the "patience diff" algorithm.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --stat[=width[,name-width]]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Generate a diffstat. You can override the default
  output width for 80-column terminal by "--stat=width".
  The width of the filename part can be controlled by
  giving another width to it separated by a comma.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --numstat
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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 <tt>-</tt> instead of saying
  <tt>0 0</tt>.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --shortstat
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Output only the last line of the --stat format containing total
  number of modified files, as well as number of added and deleted
  lines.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --dirstat[=limit]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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 in a child directory is not
  counted for the parent directory, unless "--cumulative" is used.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --dirstat-by-file[=limit]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Same as --dirstat, but counts changed files instead of lines.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --summary
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Output a condensed summary of extended header information
  such as creations, renames and mode changes.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --patch-with-stat
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Synonym for "-p --stat".
  This is the default.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -z
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  NUL-line termination on output. This affects the --raw
  output field terminator. Also output from commands such
  as "git-log" will be delimited with NUL between commits.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --name-only
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show only names of changed files.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --name-status
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show only names and status of changed files. See the description
  of the <tt>--diff-filter</tt> option on what the status letters mean.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --color
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show colored diff.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --no-color
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Turn off colored diff, even when the configuration file
  gives the default to color output.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --color-words[=&lt;regex&gt;]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show colored word diff, i.e., color words which have changed.
  By default, words are separated by whitespace.
 </p>
 <div class="para"><p>When a &lt;regex&gt; is specified, every non-overlapping match of the
 &lt;regex&gt; is considered a word. Anything between these matches is
 considered whitespace and ignored(!) for the purposes of finding
 differences. You may want to append <tt>|[^[:space:]]</tt> to your regular
 expression to make sure that it matches all non-whitespace characters.
 A match that contains a newline is silently truncated(!) at the
 newline.</p></div>
 <div class="para"><p>The regex can also be set via a diff driver or configuration option, see
 <a href="gitattributes.html">gitattributes(1)</a> or <a href="git-config.html">git-config(1)</a>. Giving it explicitly
 overrides any diff driver or configuration setting. Diff drivers
 override configuration settings.</p></div>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --no-renames
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Turn off rename detection, even when the configuration
  file gives the default to do so.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --check
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Warn if changes introduce trailing whitespace
  or an indent that uses a space before a tab. Exits with
  non-zero status if problems are found. Not compatible with
  --exit-code.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --full-index
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Instead of the first handful of characters, show the full
  pre- and post-image blob object names on the "index"
  line when generating patch format output.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --binary
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  In addition to --full-index, output "binary diff" that
  can be applied with "git apply".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --abbrev[=&lt;n&gt;]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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 --full-index option above, which controls
  the diff-patch output format. Non default number of
  digits can be specified with --abbrev=&lt;n&gt;.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -B
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Break complete rewrite changes into pairs of delete and create.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -M
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Detect renames.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -C
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Detect copies as well as renames. See also <tt>--find-copies-harder</tt>.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --diff-filter=[ACDMRTUXB*]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Select only files that are Added (<tt>A</tt>), Copied (<tt>C</tt>),
  Deleted (<tt>D</tt>), Modified (<tt>M</tt>), Renamed (<tt>R</tt>), have their
  type (i.e. regular file, symlink, submodule, &#8230;) changed (<tt>T</tt>),
  are Unmerged (<tt>U</tt>), are
  Unknown (<tt>X</tt>), or have had their pairing Broken (<tt>B</tt>).
  Any combination of the filter characters may be used.
  When <tt>*</tt> (All-or-none) is added to the combination, all
  paths are selected if there is any file that matches
  other criteria in the comparison; if there is no file
  that matches other criteria, nothing is selected.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --find-copies-harder
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  For performance reasons, by default, <tt>-C</tt> 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
  <tt>-C</tt> option has the same effect.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -l&lt;num&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  -M and -C options require O(n^2) processing time where n
  is the number of potential rename/copy targets. This
  option prevents rename/copy detection from running if
  the number of rename/copy targets exceeds the specified
  number.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -S&lt;string&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Look for differences that introduce or remove an instance of
  &lt;string&gt;. Note that this is different than the string simply
  appearing in diff output; see the <em>pickaxe</em> entry in
  <a href="gitdiffcore.html">gitdiffcore(7)</a> for more details.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --pickaxe-all
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  When -S finds a change, show all the changes in that
  changeset, not just the files that contain the change
  in &lt;string&gt;.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --pickaxe-regex
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Make the &lt;string&gt; not a plain string but an extended POSIX
  regex to match.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -O&lt;orderfile&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Output the patch in the order specified in the
  &lt;orderfile&gt;, which has one shell glob pattern per line.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -R
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Swap two inputs; that is, show differences from index or
  on-disk file to tree contents.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --relative[=&lt;path&gt;]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  When run from a subdirectory of the project, it can be
  told to exclude changes outside the directory and show
  pathnames relative to it with this option. When you are
  not in a subdirectory (e.g. in a bare repository), you
  can name which subdirectory to make the output relative
  to by giving a &lt;path&gt; as an argument.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -a
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --text
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Treat all files as text.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --ignore-space-at-eol
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Ignore changes in whitespace at EOL.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -b
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --ignore-space-change
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -w
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --ignore-all-space
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Ignore whitespace when comparing lines. This ignores
  differences even if one line has whitespace where the other
  line has none.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --inter-hunk-context=&lt;lines&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show the context between diff hunks, up to the specified number
  of lines, thereby fusing hunks that are close to each other.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --exit-code
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Make the program exit with codes similar to diff(1).
  That is, it exits with 1 if there were differences and
  0 means no differences.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --quiet
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Disable all output of the program. Implies --exit-code.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --ext-diff
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Allow an external diff helper to be executed. If you set an
  external diff driver with <a href="gitattributes.html">gitattributes(5)</a>, you need
  to use this option with <a href="git-log.html">git-log(1)</a> and friends.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --no-ext-diff
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Disallow external diff drivers.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --ignore-submodules
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Ignore changes to submodules in the diff generation.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --src-prefix=&lt;prefix&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show the given source prefix instead of "a/".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --dst-prefix=&lt;prefix&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Show the given destination prefix instead of "b/".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --no-prefix
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Do not show any source or destination prefix.
 </p>
 </dd>
 </dl></div>
 <div class="para"><p>For more detailed explanation on these common options, see also
 <a href="gitdiffcore.html">gitdiffcore(7)</a>.</p></div>
 <div class="vlist"><dl>
 <dt>
 -&lt;n&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Limits the number of patches to prepare.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -o &lt;dir&gt;
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --output-directory &lt;dir&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Use &lt;dir&gt; to store the resulting files, instead of the
  current working directory.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -n
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --numbered
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Name output in <em>[PATCH n/m]</em> format, even with a single patch.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -N
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --no-numbered
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Name output in <em>[PATCH]</em> format.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --start-number &lt;n&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Start numbering the patches at &lt;n&gt; instead of 1.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --numbered-files
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Output file names will be a simple number sequence
  without the default first line of the commit appended.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -k
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --keep-subject
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Do not strip/add <em>[PATCH]</em> from the first line of the
  commit log message.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 -s
 </dt>
 <dt>
 --signoff
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Add <tt>Signed-off-by:</tt> line to the commit message, using
  the committer identity of yourself.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --stdout
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Print all commits to the standard output in mbox format,
  instead of creating a file for each one.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --attach[=&lt;boundary&gt;]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --no-attach
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Disable the creation of an attachment, overriding the
  configuration setting.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --inline[=&lt;boundary&gt;]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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".
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --thread[=&lt;style&gt;]
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Add In-Reply-To and References headers to make the second and
  subsequent mails appear as replies to the first. Also generates
  the Message-Id header to reference.
 </p>
 <div class="para"><p>The optional &lt;style&gt; argument can be either <tt>shallow</tt> or <tt>deep</tt>.
 <em>shallow</em> threading makes every mail a reply to the head of the
 series, where the head is chosen from the cover letter, the
 <tt>--in-reply-to</tt>, and the first patch mail, in this order. <em>deep</em>
 threading makes every mail a reply to the previous one. If not
 specified, defaults to the <em>format.thread</em> configuration, or <tt>shallow</tt>
 if that is not set.</p></div>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --in-reply-to=Message-Id
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  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.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --ignore-if-in-upstream
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Do not include a patch that matches a commit in
  &lt;until&gt;..&lt;since&gt;. This will examine all patches reachable
  from &lt;since&gt; but not from &lt;until&gt; and compare them with the
  patches being generated, and any patch that matches is
  ignored.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --subject-prefix=&lt;Subject-Prefix&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Instead of the standard <em>[PATCH]</em> prefix in the subject
  line, instead use <em>[&lt;Subject-Prefix&gt;]</em>. This
  allows for useful naming of a patch series, and can be
  combined with the --numbered option.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --cc=&lt;email&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Add a "Cc:" header to the email headers. This is in addition
  to any configured headers, and may be used multiple times.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --add-header=&lt;header&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Add an arbitrary header to the email headers. This is in addition
  to any configured headers, and may be used multiple times.
  For example, --add-header="Organization: git-foo"
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --cover-letter
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  In addition to the patches, generate a cover letter file
  containing the shortlog and the overall diffstat. You can
  fill in a description in the file before sending it out.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --suffix=.&lt;sfx&gt;
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Instead of using <tt>.patch</tt> as the suffix for generated
  filenames, use specified suffix. A common alternative is
  <tt>--suffix=.txt</tt>. Leaving this empty will remove the <tt>.patch</tt>
  suffix.
 </p>
 <div class="para"><p>Note that the leading character does not have to be a dot; for example,
 you can use <tt>--suffix=-patch</tt> to get <tt>0001-description-of-my-change-patch</tt>.</p></div>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --no-binary
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Do not output contents of changes in binary files, instead
  display a notice that those files changed. Patches generated
  using this option cannot be applied properly, but they are
  still useful for code review.
 </p>
 </dd>
 <dt>
 --root
 </dt>
 <dd>
 <p>
  Treat the revision argument as a &lt;revision range&gt;, even if it
  is just a single commit (that would normally be treated as a
  &lt;since&gt;). Note that root commits included in the specified
  range are always formatted as creation patches, independently
  of this flag.
 </p>
 </dd>
 </dl></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_configuration">CONFIGURATION</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="para"><p>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 "Cc:" headers, configure attachments,
 and sign off patches with configuration variables.</p></div>
 <div class="listingblock">
 <div class="content">
 <pre><tt>[format]
  headers = "Organization: git-foo\n"
  subjectprefix = CHANGE
  suffix = .txt
  numbered = auto
  cc = &lt;email&gt;
  attach [ = mime-boundary-string ]
  signoff = true</tt></pre>
 </div></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_examples">EXAMPLES</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="ilist"><ul>
 <li>
 <p>
 Extract commits between revisions R1 and R2, and apply them on top of
 the current branch using <em>git-am</em> to cherry-pick them:
 </p>
 <div class="listingblock">
 <div class="content">
 <pre><tt>$ git format-patch -k --stdout R1..R2 | git am -3 -k</tt></pre>
 </div></div>
 </li>
 <li>
 <p>
 Extract all commits which are in the current branch but not in the
 origin branch:
 </p>
 <div class="listingblock">
 <div class="content">
 <pre><tt>$ git format-patch origin</tt></pre>
 </div></div>
 <div class="para"><p>For each commit a separate file is created in the current directory.</p></div>
 </li>
 <li>
 <p>
 Extract all commits that lead to <em>origin</em> since the inception of the
 project:
 </p>
 <div class="listingblock">
 <div class="content">
 <pre><tt>$ git format-patch --root origin</tt></pre>
 </div></div>
 </li>
 <li>
 <p>
 The same as the previous one:
 </p>
 <div class="listingblock">
 <div class="content">
 <pre><tt>$ git format-patch -M -B origin</tt></pre>
 </div></div>
 <div class="para"><p>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.</p></div>
 </li>
 <li>
 <p>
 Extract three topmost commits from the current branch and format them
 as e-mailable patches:
 </p>
 <div class="listingblock">
 <div class="content">
 <pre><tt>$ git format-patch -3</tt></pre>
 </div></div>
 </li>
 </ul></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_see_also">SEE ALSO</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="para"><p><a href="git-am.html">git-am(1)</a>, <a href="git-send-email.html">git-send-email(1)</a></p></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_author">Author</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="para"><p>Written by Junio C Hamano &lt;gitster@pobox.com&gt;</p></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_documentation">Documentation</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="para"><p>Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list &lt;git@vger.kernel.org&gt;.</p></div>
 </div>
 <h2 id="_git">GIT</h2>
 <div class="sectionbody">
 <div class="para"><p>Part of the <a href="git.html">git(1)</a> suite</p></div>
 </div>
 <div id="footer">
 <div id="footer-text">
 Last updated 2009-07-01 02:30:51 UTC
 </div>
 </div>
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