rev-list-options.txt

Commit Formatting
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

ifdef::git-rev-list[]
Using these options, linkgit:git-rev-list[1] will act similar to the
more specialized family of commit log tools: linkgit:git-log[1],
linkgit:git-show[1], and linkgit:git-whatchanged[1]
endif::git-rev-list[]

include::pretty-options.txt[]

--relative-date::

Synonym for `--date=relative`.

--date={relative,local,default,iso,rfc,short}::

Only takes effect for dates shown in human-readable format, such
as when using "--pretty". `log.date` config variable sets a default
value for log command's --date option.
+
`--date=relative` shows dates relative to the current time,
e.g. "2 hours ago".
+
`--date=local` shows timestamps in user's local timezone.
+
`--date=iso` (or `--date=iso8601`) shows timestamps in ISO 8601 format.
+
`--date=rfc` (or `--date=rfc2822`) shows timestamps in RFC 2822
format, often found in E-mail messages.
+
`--date=short` shows only date but not time, in `YYYY-MM-DD` format.
+
`--date=default` shows timestamps in the original timezone
(either committer's or author's).

ifdef::git-rev-list[]
--header::

Print the contents of the commit in raw-format; each record is
separated with a NUL character.
endif::git-rev-list[]

--parents::

Print the parents of the commit.

--children::

Print the children of the commit.

ifdef::git-rev-list[]
--timestamp::
Print the raw commit timestamp.
endif::git-rev-list[]

--left-right::

Mark which side of a symmetric diff a commit is reachable from.
Commits from the left side are prefixed with `<` and those from
the right with `>`. If combined with `--boundary`, those
commits are prefixed with `-`.
+
For example, if you have this topology:
+
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
 y---b---b branch B
 / \ /
 / .
 / / \
 o---x---a---a branch A
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
+
you would get an output line this:
+
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
$ git rev-list --left-right --boundary --pretty=oneline A...B

>bbbbbbb... 3rd on b
>bbbbbbb... 2nd on b
<aaaaaaa... 3rd on a
<aaaaaaa... 2nd on a
-yyyyyyy... 1st on b
-xxxxxxx... 1st on a
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--graph::

Draw a text-based graphical representation of the commit history
on the left hand side of the output. This may cause extra lines
to be printed in between commits, in order for the graph history
to be drawn properly.
+
This implies the '--topo-order' option by default, but the
'--date-order' option may also be specified.

Diff Formatting
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Below are listed options that control the formatting of diff output.
Some of them are specific to linkgit:git-rev-list[1], however other diff
options may be given. See linkgit:git-diff-files[1] for more options.

-c::

This flag changes the way a merge commit is displayed. It shows
the differences from each of the parents to the merge result
simultaneously instead of showing pairwise diff between a parent
and the result one at a time. Furthermore, it lists only files
which were modified from all parents.

--cc::

This flag implies the '-c' options and further compresses the
patch output by omitting hunks that show differences from only
one parent, or show the same change from all but one parent for
an Octopus merge.

-r::

Show recursive diffs.

-t::

Show the tree objects in the diff output. This implies '-r'.

Commit Limiting
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Besides specifying a range of commits that should be listed using the
special notations explained in the description, additional commit
limiting may be applied.

--

-n 'number'::
--max-count='number'::

Limit the number of commits output.

--skip='number'::

Skip 'number' commits before starting to show the commit output.

--since='date'::
--after='date'::

Show commits more recent than a specific date.

--until='date'::
--before='date'::

Show commits older than a specific date.

ifdef::git-rev-list[]
--max-age='timestamp'::
--min-age='timestamp'::

Limit the commits output to specified time range.
endif::git-rev-list[]

--author='pattern'::
--committer='pattern'::

Limit the commits output to ones with author/committer
header lines that match the specified pattern (regular expression).

--grep='pattern'::

Limit the commits output to ones with log message that
matches the specified pattern (regular expression).

-i::
--regexp-ignore-case::

Match the regexp limiting patterns without regard to letters case.

-E::
--extended-regexp::

Consider the limiting patterns to be extended regular expressions
instead of the default basic regular expressions.

-F::
--fixed-strings::

Consider the limiting patterns to be fixed strings (don't interpret
pattern as a regular expression).

--remove-empty::

Stop when a given path disappears from the tree.

--full-history::

Show also parts of history irrelevant to current state of a given
path. This turns off history simplification, which removed merges
which didn't change anything at all at some child. It will still actually
simplify away merges that didn't change anything at all into either
child.

--no-merges::

Do not print commits with more than one parent.

--first-parent::
Follow only the first parent commit upon seeing a merge
commit. This option can give a better overview when
viewing the evolution of a particular topic branch,
because merges into a topic branch tend to be only about
adjusting to updated upstream from time to time, and
this option allows you to ignore the individual commits
brought in to your history by such a merge.

--not::

Reverses the meaning of the '{caret}' prefix (or lack thereof)
for all following revision specifiers, up to the next '--not'.

--all::

Pretend as if all the refs in `$GIT_DIR/refs/` are listed on the
command line as '<commit>'.

ifdef::git-rev-list[]
--stdin::

In addition to the '<commit>' listed on the command
line, read them from the standard input.

--quiet::

Don't print anything to standard output. This form
is primarily meant to allow the caller to
test the exit status to see if a range of objects is fully
connected (or not). It is faster than redirecting stdout
to /dev/null as the output does not have to be formatted.
endif::git-rev-list[]

--cherry-pick::

Omit any commit that introduces the same change as
another commit on the "other side" when the set of
commits are limited with symmetric difference.
+
For example, if you have two branches, `A` and `B`, a usual way
to list all commits on only one side of them is with
`--left-right`, like the example above in the description of
that option. It however shows the commits that were cherry-picked
from the other branch (for example, "3rd on b" may be cherry-picked
from branch A). With this option, such pairs of commits are
excluded from the output.

-g::
--walk-reflogs::

Instead of walking the commit ancestry chain, walk
reflog entries from the most recent one to older ones.
When this option is used you cannot specify commits to
exclude (that is, '{caret}commit', 'commit1..commit2',
nor 'commit1...commit2' notations cannot be used).
+
With '\--pretty' format other than oneline (for obvious reasons),
this causes the output to have two extra lines of information
taken from the reflog. By default, 'commit@\{Nth}' notation is
used in the output. When the starting commit is specified as
'commit@{now}', output also uses 'commit@\{timestamp}' notation
instead. Under '\--pretty=oneline', the commit message is
prefixed with this information on the same line.

Cannot be combined with '\--reverse'.
See also linkgit:git-reflog[1].

--merge::

After a failed merge, show refs that touch files having a
conflict and don't exist on all heads to merge.

--boundary::

Output uninteresting commits at the boundary, which are usually
not shown.

--dense::
--sparse::

When optional paths are given, the default behaviour ('--dense') is to
only output commits that changes at least one of them, and also ignore
merges that do not touch the given paths.

Use the '--sparse' flag to makes the command output all eligible commits
(still subject to count and age limitation), but apply merge
simplification nevertheless.

ifdef::git-rev-list[]
--bisect::

Limit output to the one commit object which is roughly halfway between
the included and excluded commits. Thus, if

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
$ git-rev-list --bisect foo ^bar ^baz
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

outputs 'midpoint', the output of the two commands

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
$ git-rev-list foo ^midpoint
$ git-rev-list midpoint ^bar ^baz
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

would be of roughly the same length. Finding the change which
introduces a regression is thus reduced to a binary search: repeatedly
generate and test new 'midpoint's until the commit chain is of length
one.

--bisect-vars::

This calculates the same as `--bisect`, but outputs text ready
to be eval'ed by the shell. These lines will assign the name of
the midpoint revision to the variable `bisect_rev`, and the
expected number of commits to be tested after `bisect_rev` is
tested to `bisect_nr`, the expected number of commits to be
tested if `bisect_rev` turns out to be good to `bisect_good`,
the expected number of commits to be tested if `bisect_rev`
turns out to be bad to `bisect_bad`, and the number of commits
we are bisecting right now to `bisect_all`.

--bisect-all::

This outputs all the commit objects between the included and excluded
commits, ordered by their distance to the included and excluded
commits. The farthest from them is displayed first. (This is the only
one displayed by `--bisect`.)

This is useful because it makes it easy to choose a good commit to
test when you want to avoid to test some of them for some reason (they
may not compile for example).

This option can be used along with `--bisect-vars`, in this case,
after all the sorted commit objects, there will be the same text as if
`--bisect-vars` had been used alone.
endif::git-rev-list[]

--

Commit Ordering
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By default, the commits are shown in reverse chronological order.

--topo-order::

This option makes them appear in topological order (i.e.
descendant commits are shown before their parents).

--date-order::

This option is similar to '--topo-order' in the sense that no
parent comes before all of its children, but otherwise things
are still ordered in the commit timestamp order.

--reverse::

Output the commits in reverse order.
Cannot be combined with '\--walk-reflogs'.

Object Traversal
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

These options are mostly targeted for packing of git repositories.

--objects::

Print the object IDs of any object referenced by the listed
commits. '--objects foo ^bar' thus means "send me
all object IDs which I need to download if I have the commit
object 'bar', but not 'foo'".

--objects-edge::

Similar to '--objects', but also print the IDs of excluded
commits prefixed with a "-" character. This is used by
linkgit:git-pack-objects[1] to build "thin" pack, which records
objects in deltified form based on objects contained in these
excluded commits to reduce network traffic.

--unpacked::

Only useful with '--objects'; print the object IDs that are not
in packs.

--no-walk::

Only show the given revs, but do not traverse their ancestors.

--do-walk::

Overrides a previous --no-walk.