path: root/elpa/magit-20200728.45/magit.info-1

This is magit.info, produced by makeinfo version 6.5 from magit.texi.

     Copyright (C) 2015-2020 Jonas Bernoulli <jonas@bernoul.li>

     You can redistribute this document and/or modify it under the terms
     of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software
     Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option)
     any later version.

     This document is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
     but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
     MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
     General Public License for more details.

INFO-DIR-SECTION Emacs
START-INFO-DIR-ENTRY
* Magit: (magit).       Using Git from Emacs with Magit.
END-INFO-DIR-ENTRY


File: magit.info,  Node: Top,  Next: Introduction,  Up: (dir)

Magit User Manual
*****************

Magit is an interface to the version control system Git, implemented as
an Emacs package.  Magit aspires to be a complete Git porcelain.  While
we cannot (yet) claim that Magit wraps and improves upon each and every
Git command, it is complete enough to allow even experienced Git users
to perform almost all of their daily version control tasks directly from
within Emacs.  While many fine Git clients exist, only Magit and Git
itself deserve to be called porcelains.

This manual is for Magit version 2.90.1 (v2.90.1-1023-g7d4bcd72+1).

     Copyright (C) 2015-2020 Jonas Bernoulli <jonas@bernoul.li>

     You can redistribute this document and/or modify it under the terms
     of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software
     Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option)
     any later version.

     This document is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
     but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
     MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
     General Public License for more details.

* Menu:

* Introduction::
* Installation::
* Getting Started::
* Interface Concepts::
* Inspecting::
* Manipulating::
* Transferring::
* Miscellaneous::
* Customizing::
* Plumbing::
* FAQ::
* Debugging Tools::
* Keystroke Index::
* Command Index::
* Function Index::
* Variable Index::

— The Detailed Node Listing —

Installation

* Installing from Melpa::
* Installing from the Git Repository::
* Post-Installation Tasks::

Interface Concepts

* Modes and Buffers::
* Sections::
* Transient Commands::
* Transient Arguments and Buffer Variables::
* Completion, Confirmation and the Selection: Completion Confirmation and the Selection.
* Running Git::

Modes and Buffers

* Switching Buffers::
* Naming Buffers::
* Quitting Windows::
* Automatic Refreshing of Magit Buffers::
* Automatic Saving of File-Visiting Buffers::
* Automatic Reverting of File-Visiting Buffers::


Sections

* Section Movement::
* Section Visibility::
* Section Hooks::
* Section Types and Values::
* Section Options::


Completion, Confirmation and the Selection

* Action Confirmation::
* Completion and Confirmation::
* The Selection::
* The hunk-internal region::
* Support for Completion Frameworks::
* Additional Completion Options::


Running Git

* Viewing Git Output::
* Git Process Status::
* Running Git Manually::
* Git Executable::
* Global Git Arguments::


Inspecting

* Status Buffer::
* Repository List::
* Logging::
* Diffing::
* Ediffing::
* References Buffer::
* Bisecting::
* Visiting Files and Blobs::
* Blaming::

Status Buffer

* Status Sections::
* Status Header Sections::
* Status Module Sections::
* Status Options::


Logging

* Refreshing Logs::
* Log Buffer::
* Log Margin::
* Select from Log::
* Reflog::
* Cherries::


Diffing

* Refreshing Diffs::
* Commands Available in Diffs::
* Diff Options::
* Revision Buffer::


References Buffer

* References Sections::


Visiting Files and Blobs

* General-Purpose Visit Commands::
* Visiting Files and Blobs from a Diff::


Manipulating

* Creating Repository::
* Cloning Repository::
* Staging and Unstaging::
* Applying::
* Committing::
* Branching::
* Merging::
* Resolving Conflicts::
* Rebasing::
* Cherry Picking::
* Resetting::
* Stashing::

Staging and Unstaging

* Staging from File-Visiting Buffers::


Committing

* Initiating a Commit::
* Editing Commit Messages::


Branching

* The Two Remotes::
* Branch Commands::
* Branch Git Variables::
* Auxiliary Branch Commands::


Rebasing

* Editing Rebase Sequences::
* Information About In-Progress Rebase::


Cherry Picking

* Reverting::


Transferring

* Remotes::
* Fetching::
* Pulling::
* Pushing::
* Plain Patches::
* Maildir Patches::

Remotes

* Remote Commands::
* Remote Git Variables::


Miscellaneous

* Tagging::
* Notes::
* Submodules::
* Subtree::
* Worktree::
* Common Commands::
* Wip Modes::
* Minor Mode for Buffers Visiting Files::
* Minor Mode for Buffers Visiting Blobs::

Submodules

* Listing Submodules::
* Submodule Transient::


Wip Modes

* Wip Graph::
* Legacy Wip Modes::


Customizing

* Per-Repository Configuration::
* Essential Settings::

Essential Settings

* Safety::
* Performance::


Plumbing

* Calling Git::
* Section Plumbing::
* Refreshing Buffers::
* Conventions::

Calling Git

* Getting a Value from Git::
* Calling Git for Effect::


Section Plumbing

* Creating Sections::
* Section Selection::
* Matching Sections::


Conventions

* Theming Faces::


FAQ

* FAQ - How to ...?::
* FAQ - Issues and Errors::

FAQ - How to ...?

* How to show git's output?::
* How to install the gitman info manual?::
* How to show diffs for gpg-encrypted files?::
* How does branching and pushing work?::
* Can Magit be used as ediff-version-control-package?::
* Should I disable VC?::


FAQ - Issues and Errors

* Magit is slow::
* I changed several thousand files at once and now Magit is unusable::
* I am having problems committing::
* I am using MS Windows and cannot push with Magit::
* I am using OS X and SOMETHING works in shell, but not in Magit: I am using OS X and SOMETHING works in shell but not in Magit.
* Expanding a file to show the diff causes it to disappear::
* Point is wrong in the COMMIT_EDITMSG buffer::
* The mode-line information isn't always up-to-date::
* A branch and tag sharing the same name breaks SOMETHING::
* My Git hooks work on the command-line but not inside Magit::
* git-commit-mode isn't used when committing from the command-line::
* Point ends up inside invisible text when jumping to a file-visiting buffer::




File: magit.info,  Node: Introduction,  Next: Installation,  Prev: Top,  Up: Top

1 Introduction
**************

Magit is an interface to the version control system Git, implemented as
an Emacs package.  Magit aspires to be a complete Git porcelain.  While
we cannot (yet) claim that Magit wraps and improves upon each and every
Git command, it is complete enough to allow even experienced Git users
to perform almost all of their daily version control tasks directly from
within Emacs.  While many fine Git clients exist, only Magit and Git
itself deserve to be called porcelains.

   Staging and otherwise applying changes is one of the most important
features in a Git porcelain and here Magit outshines anything else,
including Git itself.  Git’s own staging interface (‘git add --patch’)
is so cumbersome that many users only use it in exceptional cases.  In
Magit staging a hunk or even just part of a hunk is as trivial as
staging all changes made to a file.

   The most visible part of Magit’s interface is the status buffer,
which displays information about the current repository.  Its content is
created by running several Git commands and making their output
actionable.  Among other things, it displays information about the
current branch, lists unpulled and unpushed changes and contains
sections displaying the staged and unstaged changes.  That might sound
noisy, but, since sections are collapsible, it’s not.

   To stage or unstage a change one places the cursor on the change and
then types ‘s’ or ‘u’.  The change can be a file or a hunk, or when the
region is active (i.e.  when there is a selection) several files or
hunks, or even just part of a hunk.  The change or changes that these
commands - and many others - would act on are highlighted.

   Magit also implements several other "apply variants" in addition to
staging and unstaging.  One can discard or reverse a change, or apply it
to the working tree.  Git’s own porcelain only supports this for staging
and unstaging and you would have to do something like ‘git diff ... |
??? | git apply ...’ to discard, revert, or apply a single hunk on the
command line.  In fact that’s exactly what Magit does internally (which
is what lead to the term "apply variants").

   Magit isn’t just for Git experts, but it does assume some prior
experience with Git as well as Emacs.  That being said, many users have
reported that using Magit was what finally taught them what Git is
capable of and how to use it to its fullest.  Other users wished they
had switched to Emacs sooner so that they would have gotten their hands
on Magit earlier.

   While one has to know the basic features of Emacs to be able to make
full use of Magit, acquiring just enough Emacs skills doesn’t take long
and is worth it, even for users who prefer other editors.  Vim users are
advised to give Evil (https://bitbucket.org/lyro/evil/wiki/Home), the
"Extensible VI Layer for Emacs", and Spacemacs
(https://github.com/syl20bnr/spacemacs), an "Emacs starter-kit focused
on Evil" a try.

   Magit provides a consistent and efficient Git porcelain.  After a
short learning period, you will be able to perform most of your daily
version control tasks faster than you would on the command line.  You
will likely also start using features that seemed too daunting in the
past.

   Magit fully embraces Git.  It exposes many advanced features using a
simple but flexible interface instead of only wrapping the trivial ones
like many GUI clients do.  Of course Magit supports logging, cloning,
pushing, and other commands that usually don’t fail in spectacular ways;
but it also supports tasks that often cannot be completed in a single
step.  Magit fully supports tasks such as merging, rebasing,
cherry-picking, reverting, and blaming by not only providing a command
to initiate these tasks but also by displaying context sensitive
information along the way and providing commands that are useful for
resolving conflicts and resuming the sequence after doing so.

   Magit wraps and in many cases improves upon at least the following
Git porcelain commands: ‘add’, ‘am’, ‘bisect’, ‘blame’, ‘branch’,
‘checkout’, ‘cherry’, ‘cherry-pick’, ‘clean’, ‘clone’, ‘commit’,
‘config’, ‘describe’, ‘diff’, ‘fetch’, ‘format-patch’, ‘init’, ‘log’,
‘merge’, ‘merge-tree’, ‘mv’, ‘notes’, ‘pull’, ‘rebase’, ‘reflog’,
‘remote’, ‘request-pull’, ‘reset’, ‘revert’, ‘rm’, ‘show’, ‘stash’,
‘submodule’, ‘subtree’, ‘tag’, and ‘worktree.’ Many more Magit porcelain
commands are implemented on top of Git plumbing commands.


File: magit.info,  Node: Installation,  Next: Getting Started,  Prev: Introduction,  Up: Top

2 Installation
**************

Magit can be installed using Emacs’ package manager or manually from its
development repository.

* Menu:

* Installing from Melpa::
* Installing from the Git Repository::
* Post-Installation Tasks::


File: magit.info,  Node: Installing from Melpa,  Next: Installing from the Git Repository,  Up: Installation

2.1 Installing from Melpa
=========================

Magit is available from Melpa and Melpa-Stable.  If you haven’t used
Emacs’ package manager before, then it is high time you familiarize
yourself with it by reading the documentation in the Emacs manual, see
*note (emacs)Packages::.  Then add one of the archives to
‘package-archives’:

   • To use Melpa:

     (require 'package)
     (add-to-list 'package-archives
                  '("melpa" . "http://melpa.org/packages/") t)

   • To use Melpa-Stable:

     (require 'package)
     (add-to-list 'package-archives
                  '("melpa-stable" . "http://stable.melpa.org/packages/") t)

   Once you have added your preferred archive, you need to update the
local package list using:

     M-x package-refresh-contents RET

   Once you have done that, you can install Magit and its dependencies
using:

     M-x package-install RET magit RET

   Now see *note Post-Installation Tasks::.


File: magit.info,  Node: Installing from the Git Repository,  Next: Post-Installation Tasks,  Prev: Installing from Melpa,  Up: Installation

2.2 Installing from the Git Repository
======================================

Magit depends on the ‘dash’, ‘transient’ and ‘with-editor’ libraries
which are available from Melpa and Melpa-Stable.  Install them using
‘M-x package-install RET <package> RET’.  Of course you may also install
them manually from their repository.

   Then clone the Magit repository:

     $ git clone https://github.com/magit/magit.git ~/.emacs.d/site-lisp/magit
     $ cd ~/.emacs.d/site-lisp/magit

   Then compile the libraries and generate the info manuals:

     $ make

   If you haven’t installed ‘dash’, ‘transient’ and ‘with-editor’ from
Melpa or at ‘/path/to/magit/../<package>’, then you have to tell ‘make’
where to find them.  To do so create the file ‘/path/to/magit/config.mk’
with the following content before running ‘make’:

     LOAD_PATH  = -L /path/to/magit/lisp
     LOAD_PATH += -L /path/to/dash
     LOAD_PATH += -L /path/to/transient
     LOAD_PATH += -L /path/to/with-editor

   Finally add this to your init file:

     (add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/site-lisp/magit/lisp")
     (require 'magit)

     (with-eval-after-load 'info
       (info-initialize)
       (add-to-list 'Info-directory-list
                    "~/.emacs.d/site-lisp/magit/Documentation/"))

   Note that you have to add the ‘lisp’ subdirectory to the ‘load-path’,
not the top-level of the repository, and that elements of ‘load-path’
should not end with a slash, while those of ‘Info-directory-list’
should.

   Instead of requiring the feature ‘magit’, you could load just the
autoload definitions, by loading the file ‘magit-autoloads.el’.

     (load "/path/to/magit/lisp/magit-autoloads")

   Instead of running Magit directly from the repository by adding that
to the ‘load-path’, you might want to instead install it in some other
directory using ‘sudo make install’ and setting ‘load-path’ accordingly.

   To update Magit use:

     $ git pull
     $ make

   At times it might be necessary to run ‘make clean all’ instead.

   To view all available targets use ‘make help’.

   Now see *note Post-Installation Tasks::.


File: magit.info,  Node: Post-Installation Tasks,  Prev: Installing from the Git Repository,  Up: Installation

2.3 Post-Installation Tasks
===========================

After installing Magit you should verify that you are indeed using the
Magit, Git, and Emacs releases you think you are using.  It’s best to
restart Emacs before doing so, to make sure you are not using an
outdated value for ‘load-path’.

     M-x magit-version RET

   should display something like

     Magit 2.8.0, Git 2.10.2, Emacs 25.1.1, gnu/linux

   Then you might also want to read about options that many users likely
want to customize.  See *note Essential Settings::.

   To be able to follow cross references to Git manpages found in this
manual, you might also have to manually install the ‘gitman’ info
manual, or advice ‘Info-follow-nearest-node’ to instead open the actual
manpage.  See *note How to install the gitman info manual?::.

   If you are completely new to Magit then see *note Getting Started::.

   If you run into problems, then please see the *note FAQ::.  Also see
the *note Debugging Tools::.

   And last but not least please consider making a donation, to ensure
that I can keep working on Magit.  See <https://magit.vc/donations>.
for various donation options.


File: magit.info,  Node: Getting Started,  Next: Interface Concepts,  Prev: Installation,  Up: Top

3 Getting Started
*****************

This short tutorial describes the most essential features that many
Magitians use on a daily basis.  It only scratches the surface but
should be enough to get you started.

   IMPORTANT: It is safest if you clone some repository just for this
tutorial.  Alternatively you can use an existing local repository, but
if you do that, then you should commit all uncommitted changes before
proceeding.

   To display information about the current Git repository, type ‘M-x
magit-status RET’.  You will be using this command a lot, and should
therefore give it a global key binding.  This is what we recommend:

     (global-set-key (kbd "C-x g") 'magit-status)

   Most Magit commands are commonly invoked from the status buffer.  It
can be considered the primary interface for interacting with Git using
Magit.  Many other Magit buffers may exist at a given time, but they are
often created from this buffer.

   Depending on what state your repository is in, this buffer may
contain sections titled "Staged changes", "Unstaged changes", "Unmerged
into origin/master", "Unpushed to origin/master", and many others.

   Since we are starting from a safe state, which you can easily return
to (by doing a ‘git reset --hard PRE-MAGIT-STATE’), there currently are
no staged or unstaged changes.  Edit some files and save the changes.
Then go back to the status buffer, while at the same time refreshing it,
by typing ‘C-x g’.  (When the status buffer, or any Magit buffer for
that matter, is the current buffer, then you can also use just ‘g’ to
refresh it).

   Move between sections using ‘p’ and ‘n’.  Note that the bodies of
some sections are hidden.  Type ‘TAB’ to expand or collapse the section
at point.  You can also use ‘C-tab’ to cycle the visibility of the
current section and its children.  Move to a file section inside the
section named "Unstaged changes" and type ‘s’ to stage the changes you
have made to that file.  That file now appears under "Staged changes".

   Magit can stage and unstage individual hunks, not just complete
files.  Move to the file you have just staged, expand it using ‘TAB’,
move to one of the hunks using ‘n’, and unstage just that by typing ‘u’.
Note how the staging (‘s’) and unstaging (‘u’) commands operate on the
change at point.  Many other commands behave the same way.

   You can also un-/stage just part of a hunk.  Inside the body of a
hunk section (move there using ‘C-n’), set the mark using ‘C-SPC’ and
move down until some added and/or removed lines fall inside the region
but not all of them.  Again type ‘s’ to stage.

   It is also possible to un-/stage multiple files at once.  Move to a
file section, type ‘C-SPC’, move to the next file using ‘n’, and then
‘s’ to stage both files.  Note that both the mark and point have to be
on the headings of sibling sections for this to work.  If the region
looks like it does in other buffers, then it doesn’t select Magit
sections that can be acted on as a unit.

   And then of course you want to commit your changes.  Type ‘c’.  This
shows the available commit commands and arguments in a buffer at the
bottom of the frame.  Each command and argument is prefixed with the key
that invokes/sets it.  Do not worry about this for now.  We want to
create a "normal" commit, which is done by typing ‘c’ again.

   Now two new buffers appear.  One is for writing the commit message,
the other shows a diff with the changes that you are about to committed.
Write a message and then type ‘C-c C-c’ to actually create the commit.

   You probably don’t want to push the commit you just created because
you just committed some random changes, but if that is not the case you
could push it by typing ‘P’ to show all the available push commands and
arguments and then ‘p’ to push to a branch with the same name as the
local branch onto the remote configured as the push-remote.  (If the
push-remote is not configured yet, then you would first be prompted for
the remote to push to.)

   So far we have mentioned the commit, push, and log transient prefix
commands.  These are probably among the transients you will be using the
most, but many others exist.  To show a transient that lists all other
transients (as well as the various apply commands and some other
essential commands), type ‘h’.  Try a few.

   The key bindings in that transient correspond to the bindings in
Magit buffers, including but not limited to the status buffer.  So you
could type ‘h d’ to bring up the diff transient, but once you remember
that "d" stands for "diff", you would usually do so by just typing ‘d’.
But this "prefix of prefixes" is useful even once you have memorized all
the bindings, as it can provide easy access to Magit commands from
non-Magit buffers.  You should create a global key binding for this
command too:

     (global-set-key (kbd "C-x M-g") 'magit-dispatch)

   In the same vein, you might also want to enable
‘global-magit-file-mode’ to get some more Magit key bindings in regular
file-visiting buffers (see *note Minor Mode for Buffers Visiting
Files::).

   It is not necessary that you do so now, but if you stick with Magit,
then it is highly recommended that you read the next section too.


File: magit.info,  Node: Interface Concepts,  Next: Inspecting,  Prev: Getting Started,  Up: Top

4 Interface Concepts
********************

* Menu:

* Modes and Buffers::
* Sections::
* Transient Commands::
* Transient Arguments and Buffer Variables::
* Completion, Confirmation and the Selection: Completion Confirmation and the Selection.
* Running Git::


File: magit.info,  Node: Modes and Buffers,  Next: Sections,  Up: Interface Concepts

4.1 Modes and Buffers
=====================

Magit provides several major-modes.  For each of these modes there
usually exists only one buffer per repository.  Separate modes and thus
buffers exist for commits, diffs, logs, and some other things.

   Besides these special purpose buffers, there also exists an overview
buffer, called the *status buffer*.  It’s usually from this buffer that
the user invokes Git commands, or creates or visits other buffers.

   In this manual we often speak about "Magit buffers".  By that we mean
buffers whose major-modes derive from ‘magit-mode’.

‘M-x magit-toggle-buffer-lock’     (‘magit-toggle-buffer-lock’)

     This command locks the current buffer to its value or if the buffer
     is already locked, then it unlocks it.

     Locking a buffer to its value prevents it from being reused to
     display another value.  The name of a locked buffer contains its
     value, which allows telling it apart from other locked buffers and
     the unlocked buffer.

     Not all Magit buffers can be locked to their values; for example,
     it wouldn’t make sense to lock a status buffer.

     There can only be a single unlocked buffer using a certain
     major-mode per repository.  So when a buffer is being unlocked and
     another unlocked buffer already exists for that mode and
     repository, then the former buffer is instead deleted and the
     latter is displayed in its place.

* Menu:

* Switching Buffers::
* Naming Buffers::
* Quitting Windows::
* Automatic Refreshing of Magit Buffers::
* Automatic Saving of File-Visiting Buffers::
* Automatic Reverting of File-Visiting Buffers::


File: magit.info,  Node: Switching Buffers,  Next: Naming Buffers,  Up: Modes and Buffers

4.1.1 Switching Buffers
-----------------------

 -- Function: magit-display-buffer buffer &optional display-function

     This function is a wrapper around ‘display-buffer’ and is used to
     display any Magit buffer.  It displays BUFFER in some window and,
     unlike ‘display-buffer’, also selects that window, provided
     ‘magit-display-buffer-noselect’ is ‘nil’.  It also runs the hooks
     mentioned below.

     If optional DISPLAY-FUNCTION is non-nil, then that is used to
     display the buffer.  Usually that is ‘nil’ and the function
     specified by ‘magit-display-buffer-function’ is used.

 -- Variable: magit-display-buffer-noselect

     When this is non-nil, then ‘magit-display-buffer’ only displays the
     buffer but forgoes also selecting the window.  This variable should
     not be set globally, it is only intended to be let-bound, by code
     that automatically updates "the other window".  This is used for
     example when the revision buffer is updated when you move inside
     the log buffer.

 -- User Option: magit-display-buffer-function

     The function specified here is called by ‘magit-display-buffer’
     with one argument, a buffer, to actually display that buffer.  This
     function should call ‘display-buffer’ with that buffer as first and
     a list of display actions as second argument.

     Magit provides several functions, listed below, that are suitable
     values for this option.  If you want to use different rules, then a
     good way of doing that is to start with a copy of one of these
     functions and then adjust it to your needs.

     Instead of using a wrapper around ‘display-buffer’, that function
     itself can be used here, in which case the display actions have to
     be specified by adding them to ‘display-buffer-alist’ instead.

     To learn about display actions, see *note (elisp)Choosing Window::.

 -- Function: magit-display-buffer-traditional buffer

     This function is the current default value of the option
     ‘magit-display-buffer-function’.  Before that option and this
     function were added, the behavior was hard-coded in many places all
     over the code base but now all the rules are contained in this one
     function (except for the "noselect" special case mentioned above).

 -- Function: magit-display-buffer-same-window-except-diff-v1

     This function displays most buffers in the currently selected
     window.  If a buffer’s mode derives from ‘magit-diff-mode’ or
     ‘magit-process-mode’, it is displayed in another window.

 -- Function: magit-display-buffer-fullframe-status-v1

     This function fills the entire frame when displaying a status
     buffer.  Otherwise, it behaves like
     ‘magit-display-buffer-traditional’.

 -- Function: magit-display-buffer-fullframe-status-topleft-v1

     This function fills the entire frame when displaying a status
     buffer.  It behaves like ‘magit-display-buffer-fullframe-status-v1’
     except that it displays buffers that derive from ‘magit-diff-mode’
     or ‘magit-process-mode’ to the top or left of the current buffer
     rather than to the bottom or right.  As a result, Magit buffers
     tend to pop up on the same side as they would if
     ‘magit-display-buffer-traditional’ were in use.

 -- Function: magit-display-buffer-fullcolumn-most-v1

     This function displays most buffers so that they fill the entire
     height of the frame.  However, the buffer is displayed in another
     window if (1) the buffer’s mode derives from ‘magit-process-mode’,
     or (2) the buffer’s mode derives from ‘magit-diff-mode’, provided
     that the mode of the current buffer derives from ‘magit-log-mode’
     or ‘magit-cherry-mode’.

 -- User Option: magit-pre-display-buffer-hook

     This hook is run by ‘magit-display-buffer’ before displaying the
     buffer.

 -- Function: magit-save-window-configuration

     This function saves the current window configuration.  Later when
     the buffer is buried, it may be restored by
     ‘magit-restore-window-configuration’.

 -- User Option: magit-post-display-buffer-hook

     This hook is run by ‘magit-display-buffer’ after displaying the
     buffer.

 -- Function: magit-maybe-set-dedicated

     This function remembers if a new window had to be created to
     display the buffer, or whether an existing window was reused.  This
     information is later used by ‘magit-mode-quit-window’, to determine
     whether the window should be deleted when its last Magit buffer is
     buried.


File: magit.info,  Node: Naming Buffers,  Next: Quitting Windows,  Prev: Switching Buffers,  Up: Modes and Buffers

4.1.2 Naming Buffers
--------------------

 -- User Option: magit-generate-buffer-name-function

     The function used to generate the names of Magit buffers.

     Such a function should take the options
     ‘magit-uniquify-buffer-names’ as well as ‘magit-buffer-name-format’
     into account.  If it doesn’t, then should be clearly stated in the
     doc-string.  And if it supports %-sequences beyond those mentioned
     in the doc-string of the option ‘magit-buffer-name-format’, then
     its own doc-string should describe the additions.

 -- Function: magit-generate-buffer-name-default-function mode

     This function returns a buffer name suitable for a buffer whose
     major-mode is MODE and which shows information about the repository
     in which ‘default-directory’ is located.

     This function uses ‘magit-buffer-name-format’ and supporting all of
     the %-sequences mentioned the documentation of that option.  It
     also respects the option ‘magit-uniquify-buffer-names’.

 -- User Option: magit-buffer-name-format

     The format string used to name Magit buffers.

     At least the following %-sequences are supported:

        • ‘%m’

          The name of the major-mode, but with the ‘-mode’ suffix
          removed.

        • ‘%M’

          Like ‘%m’ but abbreviate ‘magit-status-mode’ as ‘magit’.

        • ‘%v’

          The value the buffer is locked to, in parentheses, or an empty
          string if the buffer is not locked to a value.

        • ‘%V’

          Like ‘%v’, but the string is prefixed with a space, unless it
          is an empty string.

        • ‘%t’

          The top-level directory of the working tree of the repository,
          or if ‘magit-uniquify-buffer-names’ is non-nil an abbreviation
          of that.

        • ‘%x’

          If ‘magit-uniquify-buffer-names’ is nil "*", otherwise the
          empty string.  Due to limitations of the ‘uniquify’ package,
          buffer names must end with the path.

        • ‘%T’

          Obsolete, use "%t%x" instead.  Like ‘%t’, but append an
          asterisk if and only if ‘magit-uniquify-buffer-names’ is nil.

     The value should always contain ‘%m’ or ‘%M’, ‘%v’ or ‘%V’, and
     ‘%t’ (or the obsolete ‘%T’).  If ‘magit-uniquify-buffer-names’ is
     non-nil, then the value must end with ‘%t’ or ‘%t%x’ (or the
     obsolete ‘%T’).  See issue #2841.

 -- User Option: magit-uniquify-buffer-names

     This option controls whether the names of Magit buffers are
     uniquified.  If the names are not being uniquified, then they
     contain the full path of the top-level of the working tree of the
     corresponding repository.  If they are being uniquified, then they
     end with the basename of the top-level, or if that would conflict
     with the name used for other buffers, then the names of all these
     buffers are adjusted until they no longer conflict.

     This is done using the ‘uniquify’ package; customize its options to
     control how buffer names are uniquified.


File: magit.info,  Node: Quitting Windows,  Next: Automatic Refreshing of Magit Buffers,  Prev: Naming Buffers,  Up: Modes and Buffers

4.1.3 Quitting Windows
----------------------

‘q’     (‘magit-mode-bury-buffer’)

     This command buries the current Magit buffer.

     With a prefix argument, it instead kills the buffer.  With a double
     prefix argument, also kills all other Magit buffers associated with
     the current project.

 -- User Option: magit-bury-buffer-function

     The function used to actually bury or kill the current buffer.

     ‘magit-mode-bury-buffer’ calls this function with one argument.  If
     the argument is non-nil, then the function has to kill the current
     buffer.  Otherwise it has to bury it alive.  The default value
     currently is ‘magit-restore-window-configuration’.

 -- Function: magit-restore-window-configuration kill-buffer

     Bury or kill the current buffer using ‘quit-window’, which is
     called with KILL-BUFFER as first and the selected window as second
     argument.

     Then restore the window configuration that existed right before the
     current buffer was displayed in the selected frame.  Unfortunately
     that also means that point gets adjusted in all the buffers, which
     are being displayed in the selected frame.

 -- Function: magit-mode-quit-window kill-buffer

     Bury or kill the current buffer using ‘quit-window’, which is
     called with KILL-BUFFER as first and the selected window as second
     argument.

     Then, if the window was originally created to display a Magit
     buffer and the buried buffer was the last remaining Magit buffer
     that was ever displayed in the window, then that is deleted.


File: magit.info,  Node: Automatic Refreshing of Magit Buffers,  Next: Automatic Saving of File-Visiting Buffers,  Prev: Quitting Windows,  Up: Modes and Buffers

4.1.4 Automatic Refreshing of Magit Buffers
-------------------------------------------

After running a command which may change the state of the current
repository, the current Magit buffer and the corresponding status buffer
are refreshed.  The status buffer can be automatically refreshed
whenever a buffer is saved to a file inside the respective repository by
adding a hook, like so:

     (add-hook 'after-save-hook 'magit-after-save-refresh-status t)

   Automatically refreshing Magit buffers ensures that the displayed
information is up-to-date most of the time but can lead to a noticeable
delay in big repositories.  Other Magit buffers are not refreshed to
keep the delay to a minimum and also because doing so can sometimes be
undesirable.

   Buffers can also be refreshed explicitly, which is useful in buffers
that weren’t current during the last refresh and after changes were made
to the repository outside of Magit.

‘g’     (‘magit-refresh’)

     This command refreshes the current buffer if its major mode derives
     from ‘magit-mode’ as well as the corresponding status buffer.

     If the option ‘magit-revert-buffers’ calls for it, then it also
     reverts all unmodified buffers that visit files being tracked in
     the current repository.

‘G’     (‘magit-refresh-all’)

     This command refreshes all Magit buffers belonging to the current
     repository and also reverts all unmodified buffers that visit files
     being tracked in the current repository.

     The file-visiting buffers are always reverted, even if
     ‘magit-revert-buffers’ is nil.

 -- User Option: magit-refresh-buffer-hook

     This hook is run in each Magit buffer that was refreshed during the
     current refresh - normally the current buffer and the status
     buffer.

 -- User Option: magit-refresh-status-buffer

     When this option is non-nil, then the status buffer is
     automatically refreshed after running git for side-effects, in
     addition to the current Magit buffer, which is always refreshed
     automatically.

     Only set this to nil after exhausting all other options to improve
     performance.

 -- Function: magit-after-save-refresh-status

     This function is intended to be added to ‘after-save-hook’.  After
     doing that the corresponding status buffer is refreshed whenever a
     buffer is saved to a file inside a repository.

     Note that refreshing a Magit buffer is done by re-creating its
     contents from scratch, which can be slow in large repositories.  If
     you are not satisfied with Magit’s performance, then you should
     obviously not add this function to that hook.


File: magit.info,  Node: Automatic Saving of File-Visiting Buffers,  Next: Automatic Reverting of File-Visiting Buffers,  Prev: Automatic Refreshing of Magit Buffers,  Up: Modes and Buffers

4.1.5 Automatic Saving of File-Visiting Buffers
-----------------------------------------------

File-visiting buffers are by default saved at certain points in time.
This doesn’t guarantee that Magit buffers are always up-to-date, but,
provided one only edits files by editing them in Emacs and uses only
Magit to interact with Git, one can be fairly confident.  When in doubt
or after outside changes, type ‘g’ (‘magit-refresh’) to save and refresh
explicitly.

 -- User Option: magit-save-repository-buffers

     This option controls whether file-visiting buffers are saved before
     certain events.

     If this is non-nil then all modified file-visiting buffers
     belonging to the current repository may be saved before running
     commands, before creating new Magit buffers, and before explicitly
     refreshing such buffers.  If this is ‘dontask’ then this is done
     without user intervention.  If it is ‘t’ then the user has to
     confirm each save.


File: magit.info,  Node: Automatic Reverting of File-Visiting Buffers,  Prev: Automatic Saving of File-Visiting Buffers,  Up: Modes and Buffers

4.1.6 Automatic Reverting of File-Visiting Buffers
--------------------------------------------------

By default Magit automatically reverts buffers that are visiting files
that are being tracked in a Git repository, after they have changed on
disk.  When using Magit one often changes files on disk by running Git,
i.e.  "outside Emacs", making this a rather important feature.

   For example, if you discard a change in the status buffer, then that
is done by running ‘git apply --reverse ...’, and Emacs considers the
file to have "changed on disk".  If Magit did not automatically revert
the buffer, then you would have to type ‘M-x revert-buffer RET RET’ in
the visiting buffer before you could continue making changes.

 -- User Option: magit-auto-revert-mode

     When this mode is enabled, then buffers that visit tracked files
     are automatically reverted after the visited files change on disk.

 -- User Option: global-auto-revert-mode

     When this mode is enabled, then any file-visiting buffer is
     automatically reverted after the visited file changes on disk.

     If you like buffers that visit tracked files to be automatically
     reverted, then you might also like any buffer to be reverted, not
     just those visiting tracked files.  If that is the case, then
     enable this mode _instead of_ ‘magit-auto-revert-mode’.

 -- User Option: magit-auto-revert-immediately

     This option controls whether Magit reverts buffers immediately.

     If this is non-nil and either ‘global-auto-revert-mode’ or
     ‘magit-auto-revert-mode’ is enabled, then Magit immediately reverts
     buffers by explicitly calling ‘auto-revert-buffers’ after running
     Git for side-effects.

     If ‘auto-revert-use-notify’ is non-nil (and file notifications are
     actually supported), then ‘magit-auto-revert-immediately’ does not
     have to be non-nil, because the reverts happen immediately anyway.

     If ‘magit-auto-revert-immediately’ and ‘auto-revert-use-notify’ are
     both ‘nil’, then reverts happen after ‘auto-revert-interval’
     seconds of user inactivity.  That is not desirable.

 -- User Option: auto-revert-use-notify

     This option controls whether file notification functions should be
     used.  Note that this variable unfortunately defaults to ‘t’ even
     on systems on which file notifications cannot be used.

 -- User Option: magit-auto-revert-tracked-only

     This option controls whether ‘magit-auto-revert-mode’ only reverts
     tracked files or all files that are located inside Git
     repositories, including untracked files and files located inside
     Git’s control directory.

 -- User Option: auto-revert-mode

     The global mode ‘magit-auto-revert-mode’ works by turning on this
     local mode in the appropriate buffers (but
     ‘global-auto-revert-mode’ is implemented differently).  You can
     also turn it on or off manually, which might be necessary if Magit
     does not notice that a previously untracked file now is being
     tracked or vice-versa.

 -- User Option: auto-revert-stop-on-user-input

     This option controls whether the arrival of user input suspends the
     automatic reverts for ‘auto-revert-interval’ seconds.

 -- User Option: auto-revert-interval

     This option controls how many seconds Emacs waits for before
     resuming suspended reverts.

 -- User Option: auto-revert-buffer-list-filter

     This option specifies an additional filter used by
     ‘auto-revert-buffers’ to determine whether a buffer should be
     reverted or not.

     This option is provided by Magit, which also advises
     ‘auto-revert-buffers’ to respect it.  Magit users who do not turn
     on the local mode ‘auto-revert-mode’ themselves, are best served by
     setting the value to ‘magit-auto-revert-repository-buffer-p’.

     However the default is nil, so as not to disturb users who do use
     the local mode directly.  If you experience delays when running
     Magit commands, then you should consider using one of the
     predicates provided by Magit - especially if you also use Tramp.

     Users who do turn on ‘auto-revert-mode’ in buffers in which Magit
     doesn’t do that for them, should likely not use any filter.  Users
     who turn on ‘global-auto-revert-mode’, do not have to worry about
     this option, because it is disregarded if the global mode is
     enabled.

 -- User Option: auto-revert-verbose

     This option controls whether Emacs reports when a buffer has been
     reverted.

   The options with the ‘auto-revert-’ prefix are located in the Custom
group named ‘auto-revert’.  The other, Magit-specific, options are
located in the ‘magit’ group.

* Menu:

* Risk of Reverting Automatically::


File: magit.info,  Node: Risk of Reverting Automatically,  Up: Automatic Reverting of File-Visiting Buffers

Risk of Reverting Automatically
...............................

For the vast majority of users, automatically reverting file-visiting
buffers after they have changed on disk is harmless.

   If a buffer is modified (i.e.  it contains changes that haven’t been
saved yet), then Emacs will refuse to automatically revert it.  If you
save a previously modified buffer, then that results in what is seen by
Git as an uncommitted change.  Git will then refuse to carry out any
commands that would cause these changes to be lost.  In other words, if
there is anything that could be lost, then either Git or Emacs will
refuse to discard the changes.

   However, if you use file-visiting buffers as a sort of ad hoc
"staging area", then the automatic reverts could potentially cause data
loss.  So far I have heard from only one user who uses such a workflow.

   An example: You visit some file in a buffer, edit it, and save the
changes.  Then, outside of Emacs (or at least not using Magit or by
saving the buffer) you change the file on disk again.  At this point the
buffer is the only place where the intermediate version still exists.
You have saved the changes to disk, but that has since been overwritten.
Meanwhile Emacs considers the buffer to be unmodified (because you have
not made any changes to it since you last saved it to the visited file)
and therefore would not object to it being automatically reverted.  At
this point an Auto-Revert mode would kick in.  It would check whether
the buffer is modified and since that is not the case it would revert
it.  The intermediate version would be lost.  (Actually you could still
get it back using the ‘undo’ command.)

   If your workflow depends on Emacs preserving the intermediate version
in the buffer, then you have to disable all Auto-Revert modes.  But
please consider that such a workflow would be dangerous even without
using an Auto-Revert mode, and should therefore be avoided.  If Emacs
crashes or if you quit Emacs by mistake, then you would also lose the
buffer content.  There would be no autosave file still containing the
intermediate version (because that was deleted when you saved the
buffer) and you would not be asked whether you want to save the buffer
(because it isn’t modified).


File: magit.info,  Node: Sections,  Next: Transient Commands,  Prev: Modes and Buffers,  Up: Interface Concepts

4.2 Sections
============

Magit buffers are organized into nested sections, which can be collapsed
and expanded, similar to how sections are handled in Org mode.  Each
section also has a type, and some sections also have a value.  For each
section type there can also be a local keymap, shared by all sections of
that type.

   Taking advantage of the section value and type, many commands operate
on the current section, or when the region is active and selects
sections of the same type, all of the selected sections.  Commands that
only make sense for a particular section type (as opposed to just
behaving differently depending on the type) are usually bound in section
type keymaps.

* Menu:

* Section Movement::
* Section Visibility::
* Section Hooks::
* Section Types and Values::
* Section Options::


File: magit.info,  Node: Section Movement,  Next: Section Visibility,  Up: Sections

4.2.1 Section Movement
----------------------

To move within a section use the usual keys (‘C-p’, ‘C-n’, ‘C-b’, ‘C-f’
etc), whose global bindings are not shadowed.  To move to another
section use the following commands.

‘p’     (‘magit-section-backward’)

     When not at the beginning of a section, then move to the beginning
     of the current section.  At the beginning of a section, instead
     move to the beginning of the previous visible section.

‘n’     (‘magit-section-forward’)

     Move to the beginning of the next visible section.

‘M-p’     (‘magit-section-backward-siblings’)

     Move to the beginning of the previous sibling section.  If there is
     no previous sibling section, then move to the parent section
     instead.

‘M-n’     (‘magit-section-forward-siblings’)

     Move to the beginning of the next sibling section.  If there is no
     next sibling section, then move to the parent section instead.

‘^’     (‘magit-section-up’)

     Move to the beginning of the parent of the current section.

   The above commands all call the hook ‘magit-section-movement-hook’.
Any of the functions listed below can be used as members of this hook.

   You might want to remove some of the functions that Magit adds using
‘add-hook’.  In doing so you have to make sure you do not attempt to
remove function that haven’t even been added yet, for example:

     (with-eval-after-load 'magit-diff
       (remove-hook 'magit-section-movement-hook
                    'magit-hunk-set-window-start))

 -- Variable: magit-section-movement-hook

     This hook is run by all of the above movement commands, after
     arriving at the destination.

 -- Function: magit-hunk-set-window-start

     This hook function ensures that the beginning of the current
     section is visible, provided it is a ‘hunk’ section.  Otherwise, it
     does nothing.

     Loading ‘magit-diff’ adds this function to the hook.

 -- Function: magit-section-set-window-start

     This hook function ensures that the beginning of the current
     section is visible, regardless of the section’s type.  If you add
     this to ‘magit-section-movement-hook’, then you must remove the
     hunk-only variant in turn.

 -- Function: magit-log-maybe-show-more-commits

     This hook function only has an effect in log buffers, and ‘point’
     is on the "show more" section.  If that is the case, then it
     doubles the number of commits that are being shown.

     Loading ‘magit-log’ adds this function to the hook.

 -- Function: magit-log-maybe-update-revision-buffer

     When moving inside a log buffer, then this function updates the
     revision buffer, provided it is already being displayed in another
     window of the same frame.

     Loading ‘magit-log’ adds this function to the hook.

 -- Function: magit-log-maybe-update-blob-buffer

     When moving inside a log buffer and another window of the same
     frame displays a blob buffer, then this function instead displays
     the blob buffer for the commit at point in that window.

 -- Function: magit-status-maybe-update-revision-buffer

     When moving inside a status buffer, then this function updates the
     revision buffer, provided it is already being displayed in another
     window of the same frame.

 -- Function: magit-status-maybe-update-stash-buffer

     When moving inside a status buffer, then this function updates the
     stash buffer, provided it is already being displayed in another
     window of the same frame.

 -- Function: magit-status-maybe-update-blob-buffer

     When moving inside a status buffer and another window of the same
     frame displays a blob buffer, then this function instead displays
     the blob buffer for the commit at point in that window.

 -- Function: magit-stashes-maybe-update-stash-buffer

     When moving inside a buffer listing stashes, then this function
     updates the stash buffer, provided it is already being displayed in
     another window of the same frame.

 -- User Option: magit-update-other-window-delay

     Delay before automatically updating the other window.

     When moving around in certain buffers, then certain other buffers,
     which are being displayed in another window, may optionally be
     updated to display information about the section at point.

     When holding down a key to move by more than just one section, then
     that would update that buffer for each section on the way.  To
     prevent that, updating the revision buffer is delayed, and this
     option controls for how long.  For optimal experience you might
     have to adjust this delay and/or the keyboard repeat rate and delay
     of your graphical environment or operating system.


File: magit.info,  Node: Section Visibility,  Next: Section Hooks,  Prev: Section Movement,  Up: Sections

4.2.2 Section Visibility
------------------------

Magit provides many commands for changing the visibility of sections,
but all you need to get started are the next two.

‘TAB’     (‘magit-section-toggle’)

     Toggle the visibility of the body of the current section.

‘C-<tab>’     (‘magit-section-cycle’)

     Cycle the visibility of current section and its children.

‘M-<tab>’     (‘magit-section-cycle-diffs’)

     Cycle the visibility of diff-related sections in the current
     buffer.

‘S-<tab>’     (‘magit-section-cycle-global’)

     Cycle the visibility of all sections in the current buffer.

‘1’     (‘magit-section-show-level-1’)
‘2’     (‘magit-section-show-level-2’)
‘3’     (‘magit-section-show-level-3’)
‘4’     (‘magit-section-show-level-4’)

     Show sections surrounding the current section up to level N.

‘M-1’     (‘magit-section-show-level-1-all’)
‘M-2’     (‘magit-section-show-level-2-all’)
‘M-3’     (‘magit-section-show-level-3-all’)
‘M-4’     (‘magit-section-show-level-4-all’)

     Show all sections up to level N.

   Some functions, which are used to implement the above commands, are
also exposed as commands themselves.  By default no keys are bound to
these commands, as they are generally perceived to be much less useful.
But your mileage may vary.

 -- Command: magit-section-show

     Show the body of the current section.

 -- Command: magit-section-hide

     Hide the body of the current section.

 -- Command: magit-section-show-headings

     Recursively show headings of children of the current section.  Only
     show the headings.  Previously shown text-only bodies are hidden.

 -- Command: magit-section-show-children

     Recursively show the bodies of children of the current section.
     With a prefix argument show children down to the level of the
     current section, and hide deeper children.

 -- Command: magit-section-hide-children

     Recursively hide the bodies of children of the current section.

 -- Command: magit-section-toggle-children

     Toggle visibility of bodies of children of the current section.

   When a buffer is first created then some sections are shown expanded
while others are not.  This is hard coded.  When a buffer is refreshed
then the previous visibility is preserved.  The initial visibility of
certain sections can also be overwritten using the hook
‘magit-section-set-visibility-hook’.

 -- User Option: magit-section-initial-visibility-alist

     This options can be used to override the initial visibility of
     sections.  In the future it will also be used to define the
     defaults, but currently a section’s default is still hardcoded.

     The value is an alist.  Each element maps a section type or lineage
     to the initial visibility state for such sections.  The state has
     to be one of ‘show’ or ‘hide’, or a function that returns one of
     these symbols.  A function is called with the section as the only
     argument.

     Use the command ‘magit-describe-section-briefly’ to determine a
     section’s lineage or type.  The vector in the output is the section
     lineage and the type is the first element of that vector.
     Wildcards can be used, see ‘magit-section-match’.

 -- User Option: magit-section-cache-visibility

     This option controls for which sections the previous visibility
     state should be restored if a section disappears and later appears
     again.  The value is a boolean or a list of section types.  If t,
     then the visibility of all sections is cached.  Otherwise this is
     only done for sections whose type matches one of the listed types.

     This requires that the function ‘magit-section-cached-visibility’
     is a member of ‘magit-section-set-visibility-hook’.

 -- Variable: magit-section-set-visibility-hook

     This hook is run when first creating a buffer and also when
     refreshing an existing buffer, and is used to determine the
     visibility of the section currently being inserted.

     Each function is called with one argument, the section being
     inserted.  It should return ‘hide’ or ‘show’, or to leave the
     visibility undefined ‘nil’.  If no function decides on the
     visibility and the buffer is being refreshed, then the visibility
     is preserved; or if the buffer is being created, then the hard
     coded default is used.

     Usually this should only be used to set the initial visibility but
     not during refreshes.  If ‘magit-insert-section--oldroot’ is
     non-nil, then the buffer is being refreshed and these functions
     should immediately return ‘nil’.

 -- User Option: magit-section-visibility-indicator

     This option controls whether and how to indicate that a section can
     be expanded/collapsed.

     If nil, then no visibility indicators are shown.  Otherwise the
     value has to have one of these two forms:

        • ‘(EXPANDABLE-BITMAP . COLLAPSIBLE-BITMAP)’

          Both values have to be variables whose values are fringe
          bitmaps.  In this case every section that can be expanded or
          collapsed gets an indicator in the left fringe.

          To provide extra padding around the indicator, set
          ‘left-fringe-width’ in ‘magit-mode-hook’, e.g.:

               (add-hook 'magit-mode-hook (lambda ()
                                            (setq left-fringe-width 20)))

        • ‘(STRING . BOOLEAN)’

          In this case STRING (usually an ellipsis) is shown at the end
          of the heading of every collapsed section.  Expanded sections
          get no indicator.  The cdr controls whether the appearance of
          these ellipsis take section highlighting into account.  Doing
          so might potentially have an impact on performance, while not
          doing so is kinda ugly.


File: magit.info,  Node: Section Hooks,  Next: Section Types and Values,  Prev: Section Visibility,  Up: Sections

4.2.3 Section Hooks
-------------------

Which sections are inserted into certain buffers is controlled with
hooks.  This includes the status and the refs buffers.  For other
buffers, e.g.  log and diff buffers, this is not possible.  The command
‘magit-describe-section’ can be used to see which hook (if any) was
responsible for inserting the section at point.

   For buffers whose sections can be customized by the user, a hook
variable called ‘magit-TYPE-sections-hook’ exists.  This hook should be
changed using ‘magit-add-section-hook’.  Avoid using ‘add-hooks’ or the
Custom interface.

   The various available section hook variables are described later in
this manual along with the appropriate "section inserter functions".

 -- Function: magit-add-section-hook hook function &optional at append
          local

     Add the function FUNCTION to the value of section hook HOOK.

     Add FUNCTION at the beginning of the hook list unless optional
     APPEND is non-nil, in which case FUNCTION is added at the end.  If
     FUNCTION already is a member then move it to the new location.

     If optional AT is non-nil and a member of the hook list, then add
     FUNCTION next to that instead.  Add before or after AT, or replace
     AT with FUNCTION depending on APPEND.  If APPEND is the symbol
     ‘replace’, then replace AT with FUNCTION.  For any other non-nil
     value place FUNCTION right after AT.  If nil, then place FUNCTION
     right before AT.  If FUNCTION already is a member of the list but
     AT is not, then leave FUNCTION where ever it already is.

     If optional LOCAL is non-nil, then modify the hook’s buffer-local
     value rather than its global value.  This makes the hook local by
     copying the default value.  That copy is then modified.

     HOOK should be a symbol.  If HOOK is void, it is first set to nil.
     HOOK’s value must not be a single hook function.  FUNCTION should
     be a function that takes no arguments and inserts one or multiple
     sections at point, moving point forward.  FUNCTION may choose not
     to insert its section(s), when doing so would not make sense.  It
     should not be abused for other side-effects.

   To remove a function from a section hook, use ‘remove-hook’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Section Types and Values,  Next: Section Options,  Prev: Section Hooks,  Up: Sections

4.2.4 Section Types and Values
------------------------------

Each section has a type, for example ‘hunk’, ‘file’, and ‘commit’.
Instances of certain section types also have a value.  The value of a
section of type ‘file’, for example, is a file name.

   Users usually do not have to worry about a section’s type and value,
but knowing them can be handy at times.

‘M-x magit-describe-section-briefly’     (‘magit-describe-section-briefly’)

     Show information about the section at point in the echo area, as
     "#<magit-section VALUE [TYPE PARENT-TYPE...] BEGINNING-END>".

   Many commands behave differently depending on the type of the section
at point and/or somehow consume the value of that section.  But that is
only one of the reasons why the same key may do something different,
depending on what section is current.

   Additionally for each section type a keymap *might* be defined, named
‘magit-TYPE-section-map’.  That keymap is used as text property keymap
of all text belonging to any section of the respective type.  If such a
map does not exist for a certain type, then you can define it yourself,
and it will automatically be used.


File: magit.info,  Node: Section Options,  Prev: Section Types and Values,  Up: Sections

4.2.5 Section Options
---------------------

This section describes options that have an effect on more than just a
certain type of sections.  As you can see there are not many of those.

 -- User Option: magit-section-show-child-count

     Whether to append the number of children to section headings.  This
     only affects sections that could benefit from this information.


File: magit.info,  Node: Transient Commands,  Next: Transient Arguments and Buffer Variables,  Prev: Sections,  Up: Interface Concepts

4.3 Transient Commands
======================

Many Magit commands are implemented as *transient* commands.  First the
user invokes a *prefix* command, which causes its *infix* arguments and
*suffix* commands to be displayed in the echo area.  The user then
optionally sets some infix arguments and finally invokes one of the
suffix commands.

   This is implemented in the library ‘transient’.  Earlier Magit
releases used the package ‘magit-popup’ and even earlier versions
library ‘magit-key-mode’.

   Transient is documented in *note (transient)Top::.

‘C-c C-c’     (‘magit-dispatch’)

     This transient prefix command binds most of Magit’s other prefix
     commands as suffix commands and displays them in a temporary buffer
     until one of them is invoked.  Invoking such a sub-prefix causes
     the suffixes of that command to be bound and displayed instead of
     those of ‘magit-dispatch’.

   This command is also, or especially, useful outside Magit buffers, so
you should setup a global binding:

     (global-set-key (kbd "C-x M-g") 'magit-dispatch)


File: magit.info,  Node: Transient Arguments and Buffer Variables,  Next: Completion Confirmation and the Selection,  Prev: Transient Commands,  Up: Interface Concepts

4.4 Transient Arguments and Buffer Variables
============================================

The infix arguments of many of Magit’s transient prefix commands cease
to have an effect once the ‘git’ command that is called with those
arguments has returned.  Commands that create a commit are a good
example for this.  If the user changes the arguments, then that only
affects the next invocation of a suffix command.  If the same transient
prefix command is later invoked again, then the arguments are initially
reset to the default value.  This default value can be set for the
current Emacs session or saved permanently, see *note (transient)Saving
Values::.  It is also possible to cycle through previously used sets of
arguments using ‘M-p’ and ‘M-n’, see *note (transient)Using History::.

   However the infix arguments of many other transient commands continue
to have an effect even after the ‘git’ command that was called with
those arguments has returned.  The most important commands like this are
those that display a diff or log in a dedicated buffer.  Their arguments
obviously continue to have an effect for as long as the respective diff
or log is being displayed.  Furthermore the used arguments are stored in
buffer-local variables for future reference.

   For commands in the second group it isn’t always desirable to reset
their arguments to the global value when the transient prefix command is
invoked again.

   As mentioned above, it is possible to cycle through previously used
sets of arguments while a transient popup is visible.  That means that
we could always reset the infix arguments to the default because the set
of arguments that is active in the existing buffer is only a few ‘M-p’
away.  Magit can be configured to behave like that, but because I expect
that most users would not find that very convenient, it is not the
default.

   Also note that it is possible to change the diff and log arguments
used in the current buffer (including the status buffer, which contains
both diff and log sections) using the respective "refresh" transient
prefix commands on ‘D’ and ‘L’.  (‘d’ and ‘l’ on the other hand are
intended to change *what* diff or log is being displayed.  It is
possible to also change *how* the diff or log is being displayed at the
same time, but if you only want to do the latter, then you should use
the refresh variants.)  Because these secondary diff and log transient
prefixes are about *changing* the arguments used in the current buffer,
they *always* start out with the set of arguments that are currently in
effect in that buffer.

   Some commands are usually invoked directly even though they can also
be invoked as the suffix of a transient prefix command.  Most
prominently ‘magit-show-commit’ is usually invoked by typing ‘RET’ while
point is on a commit in a log, but it can also be invoked from the
‘magit-diff’ transient prefix.

   When such a command is invoked directly, then it is important to
reuse the arguments as specified by the respective buffer-local values,
instead of using the default arguments.  Imagine you press ‘RET’ in a
log to display the commit at point in a different buffer and then use
‘D’ to change how the diff is displayed in that buffer.  And then you
press ‘RET’ on another commit to show that instead and the diff
arguments are reset to the default.  Not cool; so Magit does not do that
by default.

 -- User Option: magit-prefix-use-buffer-arguments

     This option controls whether the infix arguments initially shown in
     certain transient prefix commands are based on the arguments that
     are currently in effect in the buffer that their suffixes update.

     The ‘magit-diff’ and ‘magit-log’ transient prefix commands are
     affected by this option.

 -- User Option: magit-direct-use-buffer-arguments

     This option controls whether certain commands, when invoked
     directly (i.e.  not as the suffix of a transient prefix command),
     use the arguments that are currently active in the buffer that they
     are about to update.  The alternative is to use the default value
     for these arguments, which might change the arguments that are used
     in the buffer.

Valid values for both of the above options are:

   • ‘always’: Always use the set of arguments that is currently active
     in the respective buffer, provided that buffer exists of course.

   • ‘selected’ or ‘t’: Use the set of arguments from the respective
     buffer, but only if it is displayed in a window of the current
     frame.  This is the default for both variables.

   • ‘current’: Use the set of arguments from the respective buffer, but
     only if it is the current buffer.

   • ‘never’: Never use the set of arguments from the respective buffer.

I am afraid it gets more complicated still:

   • The global diff and log arguments are set for each support mode
     individually.  The diff arguments for example have different values
     in ‘magit-diff-mode’, ‘magit-revision-mode’,
     ‘magit-merge-preview-mode’ and ‘magit-status-mode’ buffers.
     Setting or saving the value for one mode does not change the value
     for other modes.  The history however is shared.

   • When ‘magit-show-commit’ is invoked directly from a log buffer,
     then the file filter is picked up from that buffer, not from the
     revision buffer and or the mode’s global diff arguments.

   • Even though they are suffixes of the diff prefix
     ‘magit-show-commit’ and ‘magit-stash-show’ do not use the diff
     buffer used by the diff commands, instead they use the dedicated
     revision and stash buffers.

     At the time you invoke the diff prefix it is unknown to Magit which
     of the suffix commands you are going to invoke.  While not certain,
     more often than not users invoke one of the commands that use the
     diff buffer, so the initial infix arguments are those used in that
     buffer.  However if you invoke one of these commands directly, then
     Magit knows that it should use the arguments from the revision
     resp.  stash buffer.

   • The log prefix also features reflog commands, but these commands do
     not use the log arguments.

   • If ‘magit-show-refs’ is invoked from a ‘magit-refs-mode’ buffer,
     then it acts as a refresh prefix and therefore unconditionally uses
     the buffer’s arguments as initial arguments.  If it is invoked
     elsewhere with a prefix argument, then it acts as regular prefix
     and therefore respects ‘magit-prefix-use-buffer-arguments’.  If it
     is invoked elsewhere without a prefix argument, then it acts as a
     direct command and therefore respects
     ‘magit-direct-use-buffer-arguments’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Completion Confirmation and the Selection,  Next: Running Git,  Prev: Transient Arguments and Buffer Variables,  Up: Interface Concepts

4.5 Completion, Confirmation and the Selection
==============================================

* Menu:

* Action Confirmation::
* Completion and Confirmation::
* The Selection::
* The hunk-internal region::
* Support for Completion Frameworks::
* Additional Completion Options::


File: magit.info,  Node: Action Confirmation,  Next: Completion and Confirmation,  Up: Completion Confirmation and the Selection

4.5.1 Action Confirmation
-------------------------

By default many actions that could potentially lead to data loss have to
be confirmed.  This includes many very common actions, so this can
quickly become annoying.  Many of these actions can be undone and if you
have thought about how to undo certain mistakes, then it should be safe
to disable confirmation for the respective actions.

   The option ‘magit-no-confirm’ can be used to tell Magit to perform
certain actions without the user having to confirm them.  Note that
while this option can only be used to disable confirmation for a
specific set of actions, the next section explains another way of
telling Magit to ask fewer questions.

 -- User Option: magit-no-confirm

     The value of this option is a list of symbols, representing actions
     that do not have to be confirmed by the user before being carried
     out.

     By default many potentially dangerous commands ask the user for
     confirmation.  Each of the below symbols stands for an action
     which, when invoked unintentionally or without being fully aware of
     the consequences, could lead to tears.  In many cases there are
     several commands that perform variations of a certain action, so we
     don’t use the command names but more generic symbols.

        • Applying changes:

             • ‘discard’ Discarding one or more changes (i.e.  hunks or
               the complete diff for a file) loses that change,
               obviously.

             • ‘reverse’ Reverting one or more changes can usually be
               undone by reverting the reversion.

             • ‘stage-all-changes’, ‘unstage-all-changes’ When there are
               both staged and unstaged changes, then un-/staging
               everything would destroy that distinction.  Of course
               that also applies when un-/staging a single change, but
               then less is lost and one does that so often that having
               to confirm every time would be unacceptable.

        • Files:

             • ‘delete’ When a file that isn’t yet tracked by Git is
               deleted, then it is completely lost, not just the last
               changes.  Very dangerous.

             • ‘trash’ Instead of deleting a file it can also be move to
               the system trash.  Obviously much less dangerous than
               deleting it.

               Also see option ‘magit-delete-by-moving-to-trash’.

             • ‘resurrect’ A deleted file can easily be resurrected by
               "deleting" the deletion, which is done using the same
               command that was used to delete the same file in the
               first place.

             • ‘untrack’ Untracking a file can be undone by tracking it
               again.

             • ‘rename’ Renaming a file can easily be undone.

        • Sequences:

             • ‘reset-bisect’ Aborting (known to Git as "resetting") a
               bisect operation loses all information collected so far.

             • ‘abort-rebase’ Aborting a rebase throws away all already
               modified commits, but it’s possible to restore those from
               the reflog.

             • ‘abort-merge’ Aborting a merge throws away all conflict
               resolutions which have already been carried out by the
               user.

             • ‘merge-dirty’ Merging with a dirty worktree can make it
               hard to go back to the state before the merge was
               initiated.

        • References:

             • ‘delete-unmerged-branch’ Once a branch has been deleted,
               it can only be restored using low-level recovery tools
               provided by Git.  And even then the reflog is gone.  The
               user always has to confirm the deletion of a branch by
               accepting the default choice (or selecting another
               branch), but when a branch has not been merged yet, also
               make sure the user is aware of that.

             • ‘delete-pr-remote’ When deleting a branch that was
               created from a pull-request and if no other branches
               still exist on that remote, then ‘magit-branch-delete’
               offers to delete the remote as well.  This should be safe
               because it only happens if no other refs exist in the
               remotes namespace, and you can recreate the remote if
               necessary.

             • ‘drop-stashes’ Dropping a stash is dangerous because Git
               stores stashes in the reflog.  Once a stash is removed,
               there is no going back without using low-level recovery
               tools provided by Git.  When a single stash is dropped,
               then the user always has to confirm by accepting the
               default (or selecting another).  This action only
               concerns the deletion of multiple stashes at once.

        • Edit published history:

          Without adding these symbols here, you will be warned before
          editing commits that have already been pushed to one of the
          branches listed in ‘magit-published-branches’.

             • ‘amend-published’ Affects most commands that amend to
               "HEAD".

             • ‘rebase-published’ Affects commands that perform
               interactive rebases.  This includes commands from the
               commit transient that modify a commit other than "HEAD",
               namely the various fixup and squash variants.

             • ‘edit-published’ Affects the commands
               ‘magit-edit-line-commit’ and
               ‘magit-diff-edit-hunk-commit’.  These two commands make
               it quite easy to accidentally edit a published commit, so
               you should think twice before configuring them not to ask
               for confirmation.

          To disable confirmation completely, add all three symbols here
          or set ‘magit-published-branches’ to ‘nil’.

        • Various:

             • ‘kill-process’ There seldom is a reason to kill a
               process.

        • Global settings:

          Instead of adding all of the above symbols to the value of
          this option, you can also set it to the atom ‘t’, which has
          the same effect as adding all of the above symbols.  Doing
          that most certainly is a bad idea, especially because other
          symbols might be added in the future.  So even if you don’t
          want to be asked for confirmation for any of these actions,
          you are still better of adding all of the respective symbols
          individually.

          When ‘magit-wip-before-change-mode’ is enabled, then the
          following actions can be undone fairly easily: ‘discard’,
          ‘reverse’, ‘stage-all-changes’, and ‘unstage-all-changes’.  If
          and only if this mode is enabled, then ‘safe-with-wip’ has the
          same effect as adding all of these symbols individually.


File: magit.info,  Node: Completion and Confirmation,  Next: The Selection,  Prev: Action Confirmation,  Up: Completion Confirmation and the Selection

4.5.2 Completion and Confirmation
---------------------------------

Many Magit commands ask the user to select from a list of possible
things to act on, while offering the most likely choice as the default.
For many of these commands the default is the thing at point, provided
that it actually is a valid thing to act on.  For many commands that act
on a branch, the current branch serves as the default if there is no
branch at point.

   These commands combine asking for confirmation and asking for a
target to act on into a single action.  The user can confirm the default
target using ‘RET’ or abort using ‘C-g’.  This is similar to a
‘y-or-n-p’ prompt, but the keys to confirm or abort differ.

   At the same time the user is also given the opportunity to select
another target, which is useful because for some commands and/or in some
situations you might want to select the action before selecting the
target by moving to it.

   However you might find that for some commands you always want to use
the default target, if any, or even that you want the command to act on
the default without requiring any confirmation at all.  The option
‘magit-dwim-selection’ can be used to configure certain commands to that
effect.

   Note that when the region is active then many commands act on the
things that are selected using a mechanism based on the region, in many
cases after asking for confirmation.  This region-based mechanism is
called the "selection" and is described in detail in the next section.
When a selection exists that is valid for the invoked command, then that
command never offers to act on something else, and whether it asks for
confirmation is not controlled by this option.

   Also note that Magit asks for confirmation of certain actions that
are not coupled with completion (or the selection).  Such dialogs are
also not affected by this option and are described in the previous
section.

 -- User Option: magit-dwim-selection

   This option can be used to tell certain commands to use the thing at
point instead of asking the user to select a candidate to act on, with
or without confirmation.

   The value has the form ‘((COMMAND nil|PROMPT DEFAULT)...)’.

   • COMMAND is the command that should not prompt for a choice.  To
     have an effect, the command has to use the function
     ‘magit-completing-read’ or a utility function which in turn uses
     that function.

   • If the command uses ‘magit-completing-read’ multiple times, then
     PROMPT can be used to only affect one of these uses.  PROMPT, if
     non-nil, is a regular expression that is used to match against the
     PROMPT argument passed to ‘magit-completing-read’.

   • DEFAULT specifies how to use the default.  If it is ‘t’, then the
     DEFAULT argument passed to ‘magit-completing-read’ is used without
     confirmation.  If it is ‘ask’, then the user is given a chance to
     abort.  DEFAULT can also be ‘nil’, in which case the entry has no
     effect.


File: magit.info,  Node: The Selection,  Next: The hunk-internal region,  Prev: Completion and Confirmation,  Up: Completion Confirmation and the Selection

4.5.3 The Selection
-------------------

If the region is active, then many Magit commands act on the things that
are selected using a mechanism based on the region instead of one single
thing.  When the region is not active, then these commands act on the
thing at point or read a single thing to act on.  This is described in
the previous section — this section only covers how multiple things are
selected, how that is visualized, and how certain commands behave when
that is the case.

   Magit’s mechanism for selecting multiple things, or rather sections
that represent these things, is based on the Emacs region, but the area
that Magit considers to be selected is typically larger than the region
and additional restrictions apply.

   Magit makes a distinction between a region that qualifies as forming
a valid Magit selection and a region that does not.  If the region does
not qualify, then it is displayed as it is in other Emacs buffers.  If
the region does qualify as a Magit selection, then the selection is
always visualized, while the region itself is only visualized if it
begins and ends on the same line.

   For a region to qualify as a Magit selection, it must begin in the
heading of one section and end in the heading of a sibling section.
Note that if the end of the region is at the very beginning of section
heading (i.e.  at the very beginning of a line) then that section is
considered to be *inside* the selection.

   This is not consistent with how the region is normally treated in
Emacs — if the region ends at the beginning of a line, then that line is
outside the region.  Due to how Magit visualizes the selection, it
should be obvious that this difference exists.

   Not every command acts on every valid selection.  Some commands do
not even consider the location of point, others may act on the section
at point but not support acting on the selection, and even commands that
do support the selection of course only do so if it selects things that
they can act on.

   This is the main reason why the selection must include the section at
point.  Even if a selection exists, the invoked command may disregard
it, in which case it may act on the current section only.  It is much
safer to only act on the current section but not the other selected
sections than it is to act on the current section *instead* of the
selected sections.  The latter would be much more surprising and if the
current section always is part of the selection, then that cannot
happen.

 -- Variable: magit-keep-region-overlay

     This variable controls whether the region is visualized as usual
     even when a valid Magit selection or a hunk-internal region exists.
     See the doc-string for more information.


File: magit.info,  Node: The hunk-internal region,  Next: Support for Completion Frameworks,  Prev: The Selection,  Up: Completion Confirmation and the Selection

4.5.4 The hunk-internal region
------------------------------

Somewhat related to the Magit selection described in the previous
section is the hunk-internal region.

   Like the selection, the hunk-internal region is based on the Emacs
region but causes that region to not be visualized as it would in other
Emacs buffers, and includes the line on which the region ends even if it
ends at the very beginning of that line.

   Unlike the selection, which is based on a region that must begin in
the heading of one section and ends in the section of a sibling section,
the hunk-internal region must begin inside the *body* of a hunk section
and end in the body of the *same* section.

   The hunk-internal region is honored by "apply" commands, which can,
among other targets, act on a hunk.  If the hunk-internal region is
active, then such commands act only on the marked part of the hunk
instead of on the complete hunk.


File: magit.info,  Node: Support for Completion Frameworks,  Next: Additional Completion Options,  Prev: The hunk-internal region,  Up: Completion Confirmation and the Selection

4.5.5 Support for Completion Frameworks
---------------------------------------

The built-in option ‘completing-read-function’ specifies the low-level
function used by ‘completing-read’ to ask a user to select from a list
of choices.  Its default value is ‘completing-read-default’.
Alternative completion frameworks typically activate themselves by
substituting their own implementation.

   Mostly for historic reasons Magit provides a similar option named
‘magit-completing-read-function’, which only controls the low-level
function used by ‘magit-completing-read’.  This option also makes it
possible to use a different completing mechanism for Magit than for the
rest of Emacs, but doing that is not recommend.

   You most likely don’t have to customize the magit-specific option to
use an alternative completion framework.  For example, if you enable
‘ivy-mode’, then Magit will respect that, and if you enable ‘helm-mode’,
then you are done too.

   However if you want to use Ido, then ‘ido-mode’ won’t do the trick.
You will also have to install the ‘ido-completing-read+’ package and use
‘magit-ido-completing-read’ as ‘magit-completing-read-function’.

 -- User Option: magit-completing-read-function

     The value of this variable is the low-level function used to
     perform completion by code that uses ‘magit-completing-read’ (as
     opposed to the built-in ‘completing-read’).

     The default value, ‘magit-builtin-completing-read’, is suitable for
     the standard completion mechanism, ‘ivy-mode’, and ‘helm-mode’ at
     least.

     The built-in ‘completing-read’ and ‘completing-read-default’ are
     *not* suitable to be used here.  ‘magit-builtin-completing-read’
     performs some additional work, and any function used in its place
     has to do the same.

 -- Function: magit-builtin-completing-read prompt choices &optional
          predicate require-match initial-input hist def

     This function performs completion using the built-in
     ‘completing-read’ and does some additional magit-specific work.

 -- Function: magit-ido-completing-read prompt choices &optional
          predicate require-match initial-input hist def

     This function performs completion using ‘ido-completing-read+’ from
     the package by the same name (which you have to explicitly install)
     and does some additional magit-specific work.

     We have to use ‘ido-completing-read+’ instead of the
     ‘ido-completing-read’ that comes with Ido itself, because the
     latter, while intended as a drop-in replacement, cannot serve that
     purpose because it violates too many of the implicit conventions.

 -- Function: magit-completing-read prompt choices &optional predicate
          require-match initial-input hist def fallback

     This is the function that Magit commands use when they need the
     user to select a single thing to act on.  The arguments have the
     same meaning as for ‘completing-read’, except for FALLBACK, which
     is unique to this function and is described below.

     Instead of asking the user to choose from a list of possible
     candidates, this function may just return the default specified by
     DEF, with or without requiring user confirmation.  Whether that is
     the case depends on PROMPT, ‘this-command’ and
     ‘magit-dwim-selection’.  See the documentation of the latter for
     more information.

     If it does read a value in the minibuffer, then this function acts
     similar to ‘completing-read’, except for the following:

        • COLLECTION must be a list of choices.  A function is not
          supported.

        • If REQUIRE-MATCH is ‘nil’ and the user exits without a choice,
          then ‘nil’ is returned instead of an empty string.

        • If REQUIRE-MATCH is non-nil and the users exits without a
          choice, an user-error is raised.

        • FALLBACK specifies a secondary default that is only used if
          the primary default DEF is ‘nil’.  The secondary default is
          not subject to ‘magit-dwim-selection’ — if DEF is ‘nil’ but
          FALLBACK is not, then this function always asks the user to
          choose a candidate, just as if both defaults were ‘nil’.

        • ": " is appended to PROMPT.

        • PROMPT is modified to end with \" (default DEF|FALLBACK): \"
          provided that DEF or FALLBACK is non-nil, that neither
          ‘ivy-mode’ nor ‘helm-mode’ is enabled, and that
          ‘magit-completing-read-function’ is set to its default value
          of ‘magit-builtin-completing-read’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Additional Completion Options,  Prev: Support for Completion Frameworks,  Up: Completion Confirmation and the Selection

4.5.6 Additional Completion Options
-----------------------------------

 -- User Option: magit-list-refs-sortby

     For many commands that read a ref or refs from the user, the value
     of this option can be used to control the order of the refs.  Valid
     values include any key accepted by the ‘--sort’ flag of ‘git
     for-each-ref’.  By default, refs are sorted alphabetically by their
     full name (e.g., "refs/heads/master").


File: magit.info,  Node: Running Git,  Prev: Completion Confirmation and the Selection,  Up: Interface Concepts

4.6 Running Git
===============

* Menu:

* Viewing Git Output::
* Git Process Status::
* Running Git Manually::
* Git Executable::
* Global Git Arguments::


File: magit.info,  Node: Viewing Git Output,  Next: Git Process Status,  Up: Running Git

4.6.1 Viewing Git Output
------------------------

Magit runs Git either for side-effects (e.g.  when pushing) or to get
some value (e.g.  the name of the current branch).

   When Git is run for side-effects, the process output is logged in a
per-repository log buffer, which can be consulted using the
‘magit-process’ command when things don’t go as expected.

   The output/errors for up to ‘magit-process-log-max’ Git commands are
retained.

‘$’     (‘magit-process’)

     This commands displays the process buffer for the current
     repository.

   Inside that buffer, the usual key bindings for navigating and showing
sections are available.  There is one additional command.

‘k’     (‘magit-process-kill’)

     This command kills the process represented by the section at point.

 -- User Option: magit-git-debug

     When this is non-nil then the output of all calls to git are logged
     in the process buffer.  This is useful when debugging, otherwise it
     just negatively affects performance.


File: magit.info,  Node: Git Process Status,  Next: Running Git Manually,  Prev: Viewing Git Output,  Up: Running Git

4.6.2 Git Process Status
------------------------

When a Git process is running for side-effects, Magit displays an
indicator in the mode line, using the ‘magit-mode-line-process’ face.

   If the Git process exits successfully, the process indicator is
removed from the mode line immediately.

   In the case of a Git error, the process indicator is not removed, but
is instead highlighted with the ‘magit-mode-line-process-error’ face,
and the error details from the process buffer are provided as a tooltip
for mouse users.  This error indicator persists in the mode line until
the next magit buffer refresh.

   If you do not wish process errors to be indicated in the mode line,
customize the ‘magit-process-display-mode-line-error’ user option.

   Process errors are additionally indicated at the top of the status
buffer.


File: magit.info,  Node: Running Git Manually,  Next: Git Executable,  Prev: Git Process Status,  Up: Running Git

4.6.3 Running Git Manually
--------------------------

While Magit provides many Emacs commands to interact with Git, it does
not cover everything.  In those cases your existing Git knowledge will
come in handy.  Magit provides some commands for running arbitrary Git
commands by typing them into the minibuffer, instead of having to switch
to a shell.

‘!’     (‘magit-run’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘! !’     (‘magit-git-command-topdir’)

     This command reads a command from the user and executes it in the
     top-level directory of the current working tree.

     The string "git " is used as initial input when prompting the user
     for the command.  It can be removed to run another command.

‘! p’     (‘magit-git-command’)

     This command reads a command from the user and executes it in
     ‘default-directory’.  With a prefix argument the command is
     executed in the top-level directory of the current working tree
     instead.

     The string "git " is used as initial input when prompting the user
     for the command.  It can be removed to run another command.

‘! s’     (‘magit-shell-command-topdir’)

     This command reads a command from the user and executes it in the
     top-level directory of the current working tree.

‘! S’     (‘magit-shell-command’)

     This command reads a command from the user and executes it in
     ‘default-directory’.  With a prefix argument the command is
     executed in the top-level directory of the current working tree
     instead.

 -- User Option: magit-shell-command-verbose-prompt

     Whether the prompt, used by the above commands when reading a shell
     command, shows the directory in which it will be run.

   These suffix commands start external gui tools.

‘! k’     (‘magit-run-gitk’)

     This command runs ‘gitk’ in the current repository.

‘! a’     (‘magit-run-gitk-all’)

     This command runs ‘gitk --all’ in the current repository.

‘! b’     (‘magit-run-gitk-branches’)

     This command runs ‘gitk --branches’ in the current repository.

‘! g’     (‘magit-run-git-gui’)

     This command runs ‘git gui’ in the current repository.


File: magit.info,  Node: Git Executable,  Next: Global Git Arguments,  Prev: Running Git Manually,  Up: Running Git

4.6.4 Git Executable
--------------------

Except on MS Windows, Magit defaults to running Git without specifying
the path to the git executable.  Instead the first executable found by
Emacs on ‘exec-path’ is used (whose value in turn is set based on the
value of the environment variable ‘$PATH’ when Emacs was started).

   This has the advantage that it continues to work even when using
Tramp to connect to a remote machine on which the executable is found in
a different place.  The downside is that if you have multiple versions
of Git installed, then you might end up using another version than the
one you think you are using.

‘M-x magit-version’     (‘magit-version’)

     This command shows the currently used versions of Magit, Git, and
     Emacs in the echo area.  Non-interactively this just returns the
     Magit version.

   When the ‘system-type’ is ‘windows-nt’, then ‘magit-git-executable’
is set to an absolute path when Magit is first loaded.  This is
necessary because Git on that platform comes with several wrapper
scripts for the actual git binary, which are also placed on ‘$PATH’, and
using one of these wrappers instead of the binary would degrade
performance horribly.

   If Magit doesn’t find the correct executable then you *can* work
around that by setting ‘magit-git-executable’ to an absolute path.  But
note that doing so is a kludge.  It is better to make sure the order in
the environment variable ‘$PATH’ is correct, and that Emacs is started
with that environment in effect.  The command
‘magit-debug-git-executable’ can be useful to find out where Emacs is
searching for git.  If you have to connect from Windows to a non-Windows
machine, then you must change the value to "git".

 -- User Option: magit-git-executable

     The git executable used by Magit, either the full path to the
     executable or the string "git" to let Emacs find the executable
     itself, using the standard mechanism for doing such things.

‘M-x magit-debug-git-executable’     (‘magit-debug-git-executable’)

     Display a buffer with information about ‘magit-git-executable’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Global Git Arguments,  Prev: Git Executable,  Up: Running Git

4.6.5 Global Git Arguments
--------------------------

 -- User Option: magit-git-global-arguments

     The arguments set here are used every time the git executable is
     run as a subprocess.  They are placed right after the executable
     itself and before the git command - as in ‘git HERE... COMMAND
     REST’.  For valid arguments see *note (gitman)git::.

     Be careful what you add here, especially if you are using Tramp to
     connect to servers with ancient Git versions.  Never remove
     anything that is part of the default value, unless you really know
     what you are doing.  And think very hard before adding something;
     it will be used every time Magit runs Git for any purpose.


File: magit.info,  Node: Inspecting,  Next: Manipulating,  Prev: Interface Concepts,  Up: Top

5 Inspecting
************

The functionality provided by Magit can be roughly divided into three
groups: inspecting existing data, manipulating existing data or adding
new data, and transferring data.  Of course that is a rather crude
distinction that often falls short, but it’s more useful than no
distinction at all.  This section is concerned with inspecting data, the
next two with manipulating and transferring it.  Then follows a section
about miscellaneous functionality, which cannot easily be fit into this
distinction.

   Of course other distinctions make sense too, e.g.  Git’s distinction
between porcelain and plumbing commands, which for the most part is
equivalent to Emacs’ distinction between interactive commands and
non-interactive functions.  All of the sections mentioned before are
mainly concerned with the porcelain – Magit’s plumbing layer is
described later.

* Menu:

* Status Buffer::
* Repository List::
* Logging::
* Diffing::
* Ediffing::
* References Buffer::
* Bisecting::
* Visiting Files and Blobs::
* Blaming::


File: magit.info,  Node: Status Buffer,  Next: Repository List,  Up: Inspecting

5.1 Status Buffer
=================

While other Magit buffers contain e.g.  one particular diff or one
particular log, the status buffer contains the diffs for staged and
unstaged changes, logs for unpushed and unpulled commits, lists of
stashes and untracked files, and information related to the current
branch.

   During certain incomplete operations – for example when a merge
resulted in a conflict – additional information is displayed that helps
proceeding with or aborting the operation.

   The command ‘magit-status’ displays the status buffer belonging to
the current repository in another window.  This command is used so often
that it should be bound globally.  We recommend using ‘C-x g’:

     (global-set-key (kbd "C-x g") 'magit-status)

‘C-x g’     (‘magit-status’)

     When invoked from within an existing Git repository, then this
     command shows the status of that repository in a buffer.

     If the current directory isn’t located within a Git repository,
     then this command prompts for an existing repository or an
     arbitrary directory, depending on the option
     ‘magit-repository-directories’, and the status for the selected
     repository is shown instead.

        • If that option specifies any existing repositories, then the
          user is asked to select one of them.

        • Otherwise the user is asked to select an arbitrary directory
          using regular file-name completion.  If the selected directory
          is the top-level directory of an existing working tree, then
          the status buffer for that is shown.

        • Otherwise the user is offered to initialize the selected
          directory as a new repository.  After creating the repository
          its status buffer is shown.

     These fallback behaviors can also be forced using one or more
     prefix arguments:

        • With two prefix arguments (or more precisely a numeric prefix
          value of 16 or greater) an arbitrary directory is read, which
          is then acted on as described above.  The same could be
          accomplished using the command ‘magit-init’.

        • With a single prefix argument an existing repository is read
          from the user, or if no repository can be found based on the
          value of ‘magit-repository-directories’, then the behavior is
          the same as with two prefix arguments.

 -- User Option: magit-repository-directories

     List of directories that are Git repositories or contain Git
     repositories.

     Each element has the form ‘(DIRECTORY . DEPTH)’.  DIRECTORY has to
     be a directory or a directory file-name, a string.  DEPTH, an
     integer, specifies the maximum depth to look for Git repositories.
     If it is 0, then only add DIRECTORY itself.

     This option controls which repositories are being listed by
     ‘magit-list-repositories’.  It also affects ‘magit-status’ (which
     see) in potentially surprising ways (see above).

 -- Command: ido-enter-magit-status

     From an Ido prompt used to open a file, instead drop into
     ‘magit-status’.  This is similar to ‘ido-magic-delete-char’, which,
     despite its name, usually causes a Dired buffer to be created.

     To make this command available, use something like:

          (add-hook 'ido-setup-hook
                    (lambda ()
                      (define-key ido-completion-map
                        (kbd \"C-x g\") 'ido-enter-magit-status)))

     Starting with Emacs 25.1 the Ido keymaps are defined just once
     instead of every time Ido is invoked, so now you can modify it like
     pretty much every other keymap:

          (define-key ido-common-completion-map
            (kbd \"C-x g\") 'ido-enter-magit-status)

* Menu:

* Status Sections::
* Status Header Sections::
* Status Module Sections::
* Status Options::


File: magit.info,  Node: Status Sections,  Next: Status Header Sections,  Up: Status Buffer

5.1.1 Status Sections
---------------------

The contents of status buffers is controlled using the hook
‘magit-status-sections-hook’.  See *note Section Hooks:: to learn about
such hooks and how to customize them.

 -- User Option: magit-status-sections-hook

     Hook run to insert sections into a status buffer.

   The first function on that hook by default is
‘magit-insert-status-headers’; it is described in the next section.  By
default the following functions are also members of that hook:

 -- Function: magit-insert-merge-log

     Insert section for the on-going merge.  Display the heads that are
     being merged.  If no merge is in progress, do nothing.

 -- Function: magit-insert-rebase-sequence

     Insert section for the on-going rebase sequence.  If no such
     sequence is in progress, do nothing.

 -- Function: magit-insert-am-sequence

     Insert section for the on-going patch applying sequence.  If no
     such sequence is in progress, do nothing.

 -- Function: magit-insert-sequencer-sequence

     Insert section for the on-going cherry-pick or revert sequence.  If
     no such sequence is in progress, do nothing.

 -- Function: magit-insert-bisect-output

     While bisecting, insert section with output from ‘git bisect’.

 -- Function: magit-insert-bisect-rest

     While bisecting, insert section visualizing the bisect state.

 -- Function: magit-insert-bisect-log

     While bisecting, insert section logging bisect progress.

 -- Function: magit-insert-untracked-files

     Maybe insert a list or tree of untracked files.

     Do so depending on the value of ‘status.showUntrackedFiles’.  Note
     that even if the value is ‘all’, Magit still initially only shows
     directories.  But the directory sections can then be expanded using
     ‘TAB’.

 -- Function: magit-insert-unstaged-changes

     Insert section showing unstaged changes.

 -- Function: magit-insert-staged-changes

     Insert section showing staged changes.

 -- Function: magit-insert-stashes &optional ref heading

     Insert the ‘stashes’ section showing reflog for "refs/stash".  If
     optional REF is non-nil show reflog for that instead.  If optional
     HEADING is non-nil use that as section heading instead of
     "Stashes:".

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpulled-from-upstream

     Insert section showing commits that haven’t been pulled from the
     upstream branch yet.

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpulled-from-pushremote

     Insert section showing commits that haven’t been pulled from the
     push-remote branch yet.

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpushed-to-upstream

     Insert section showing commits that haven’t been pushed to the
     upstream yet.

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpushed-to-pushremote

     Insert section showing commits that haven’t been pushed to the
     push-remote yet.

   The following functions can also be added to the above hook:

 -- Function: magit-insert-tracked-files

     Insert a tree of tracked files.

 -- Function: magit-insert-ignored-files

     Insert a tree of ignored files.  Its possible to limit the logs in
     the current buffer to a certain directory using ‘D = f <DIRECTORY>
     RET g’.  If you do that, then that that also affects this command.

     The log filter can be used to limit to multiple files.  In that
     case this function only respects the first of the files and only if
     it is a directory.

 -- Function: magit-insert-skip-worktree-files

     Insert a tree of skip-worktree files.  If the first element of
     ‘magit-buffer-diff-files’ is a directory, then limit the list to
     files below that.  The value of that variable can be set using ‘D
     -- DIRECTORY RET g’.

 -- Function: magit-insert-assumed-unchanged-files

     Insert a tree of files that are assumed to be unchanged.  If the
     first element of ‘magit-buffer-diff-files’ is a directory, then
     limit the list to files below that.  The value of that variable can
     be set using ‘D -- DIRECTORY RET g’.

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpulled-or-recent-commits

     Insert section showing unpulled or recent commits.  If an upstream
     is configured for the current branch and it is ahead of the current
     branch, then show the missing commits.  Otherwise, show the last
     ‘magit-log-section-commit-count’ commits.

 -- Function: magit-insert-recent-commits

     Insert section showing the last ‘magit-log-section-commit-count’
     commits.

 -- User Option: magit-log-section-commit-count

     How many recent commits ‘magit-insert-recent-commits’ and
     ‘magit-insert-unpulled-or-recent-commits’ (provided there are no
     unpulled commits) show.

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpulled-cherries

     Insert section showing unpulled commits.  Like
     ‘magit-insert-unpulled-commits’ but prefix each commit that has not
     been applied yet (i.e.  a commit with a patch-id not shared with
     any local commit) with "+", and all others with "-".

 -- Function: magit-insert-unpushed-cherries

     Insert section showing unpushed commits.  Like
     ‘magit-insert-unpushed-commits’ but prefix each commit which has
     not been applied to upstream yet (i.e.  a commit with a patch-id
     not shared with any upstream commit) with "+" and all others with
     "-".

   See *note References Buffer:: for some more section inserters, which
could be used here.


File: magit.info,  Node: Status Header Sections,  Next: Status Module Sections,  Prev: Status Sections,  Up: Status Buffer

5.1.2 Status Header Sections
----------------------------

The contents of status buffers is controlled using the hook
‘magit-status-sections-hook’ (see *note Status Sections::).

   By default ‘magit-insert-status-headers’ is the first member of that
hook variable.

 -- Function: magit-insert-status-headers

     Insert headers sections appropriate for ‘magit-status-mode’
     buffers.  The sections are inserted by running the functions on the
     hook ‘magit-status-headers-hook’.

 -- User Option: magit-status-headers-hook

     Hook run to insert headers sections into the status buffer.

     This hook is run by ‘magit-insert-status-headers’, which in turn
     has to be a member of ‘magit-status-sections-hook’ to be used at
     all.

   By default the following functions are members of the above hook:

 -- Function: magit-insert-error-header

     Insert a header line showing the message about the Git error that
     just occurred.

     This function is only aware of the last error that occur when Git
     was run for side-effects.  If, for example, an error occurs while
     generating a diff, then that error won’t be inserted.  Refreshing
     the status buffer causes this section to disappear again.

 -- Function: magit-insert-diff-filter-header

     Insert a header line showing the effective diff filters.

 -- Function: magit-insert-head-branch-header

     Insert a header line about the current branch or detached ‘HEAD’.

 -- Function: magit-insert-upstream-branch-header

     Insert a header line about the branch that is usually pulled into
     the current branch.

 -- Function: magit-insert-push-branch-header

     Insert a header line about the branch that the current branch is
     usually pushed to.

 -- Function: magit-insert-tags-header

     Insert a header line about the current and/or next tag, along with
     the number of commits between the tag and ‘HEAD’.

   The following functions can also be added to the above hook:

 -- Function: magit-insert-repo-header

     Insert a header line showing the path to the repository top-level.

 -- Function: magit-insert-remote-header

     Insert a header line about the remote of the current branch.

     If no remote is configured for the current branch, then fall back
     showing the "origin" remote, or if that does not exist the first
     remote in alphabetic order.

 -- Function: magit-insert-user-header

     Insert a header line about the current user.


File: magit.info,  Node: Status Module Sections,  Next: Status Options,  Prev: Status Header Sections,  Up: Status Buffer

5.1.3 Status Module Sections
----------------------------

The contents of status buffers is controlled using the hook
‘magit-status-sections-hook’ (see *note Status Sections::).

   By default ‘magit-insert-modules’ is _not_ a member of that hook
variable.

 -- Function: magit-insert-modules

     Insert submodule sections.

     Hook ‘magit-module-sections-hook’ controls which module sections
     are inserted, and option ‘magit-module-sections-nested’ controls
     whether they are wrapped in an additional section.

 -- User Option: magit-module-sections-hook

     Hook run by ‘magit-insert-modules’.

 -- User Option: magit-module-sections-nested

     This option controls whether ‘magit-insert-modules’ wraps inserted
     sections in an additional section.

     If this is non-nil, then only a single top-level section is
     inserted.  If it is nil, then all sections listed in
     ‘magit-module-sections-hook’ become top-level sections.

 -- Function: magit-insert-modules-overview

     Insert sections for all submodules.  For each section insert the
     path, the branch, and the output of ‘git describe --tags’, or,
     failing that, the abbreviated HEAD commit hash.

     Press ‘RET’ on such a submodule section to show its own status
     buffer.  Press ‘RET’ on the "Modules" section to display a list of
     submodules in a separate buffer.  This shows additional information
     not displayed in the super-repository’s status buffer.

 -- Function: magit-insert-modules-unpulled-from-upstream

     Insert sections for modules that haven’t been pulled from the
     upstream yet.  These sections can be expanded to show the
     respective commits.

 -- Function: magit-insert-modules-unpulled-from-pushremote

     Insert sections for modules that haven’t been pulled from the
     push-remote yet.  These sections can be expanded to show the
     respective commits.

 -- Function: magit-insert-modules-unpushed-to-upstream

     Insert sections for modules that haven’t been pushed to the
     upstream yet.  These sections can be expanded to show the
     respective commits.

 -- Function: magit-insert-modules-unpushed-to-pushremote

     Insert sections for modules that haven’t been pushed to the
     push-remote yet.  These sections can be expanded to show the
     respective commits.


File: magit.info,  Node: Status Options,  Prev: Status Module Sections,  Up: Status Buffer

5.1.4 Status Options
--------------------

 -- User Option: magit-status-refresh-hook

     Hook run after a status buffer has been refreshed.

 -- User Option: magit-status-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     Magit-Status mode buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.

   Also see the proceeding section for more options concerning status
buffers.


File: magit.info,  Node: Repository List,  Next: Logging,  Prev: Status Buffer,  Up: Inspecting

5.2 Repository List
===================

 -- Command: magit-list-repositories

     This command displays a list of repositories in a separate buffer.

     The options ‘magit-repository-directories’ and
     ‘magit-repository-directories-depth’ control which repositories are
     displayed.

 -- User Option: magit-repolist-columns

     This option controls what columns are displayed by the command
     ‘magit-list-repositories’ and how they are displayed.

     Each element has the form ‘(HEADER WIDTH FORMAT PROPS)’.

     HEADER is the string displayed in the header.  WIDTH is the width
     of the column.  FORMAT is a function that is called with one
     argument, the repository identification (usually its basename), and
     with ‘default-directory’ bound to the toplevel of its working tree.
     It has to return a string to be inserted or nil.  PROPS is an alist
     that supports the keys ‘:right-align’ and ‘:pad-right’.

   The following functions can be added to the above option:

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-ident

     This function inserts the identification of the repository.
     Usually this is just its basename.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-path

     This function inserts the absolute path of the repository.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-version

     This function inserts a description of the repository’s ‘HEAD’
     revision.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-branch

     This function inserts the name of the current branch.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-upstream

     This function inserts the name of the upstream branch of the
     current branch.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-branches

     This function inserts the number of branches.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-stashes

     This function inserts the number of stashes.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-flag

     This function inserts a flag as specified by
     ‘magit-repolist-column-flag-alist’.

     By default this indicates whether there are uncommitted changes.

        • ‘N’ if there is at least one untracked file.

        • ‘U’ if there is at least one unstaged file.

        • ‘S’ if there is at least one staged file.

     Only the first one of these that applies is shown.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-unpulled-from-upstream

     This function inserts the number of upstream commits not in the
     current branch.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-unpulled-from-pushremote

     This function inserts the number of commits in the push branch but
     not the current branch.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-unpushed-to-upstream

     This function inserts the number of commits in the current branch
     but not its upstream.

 -- Function: magit-repolist-column-unpushed-to-pushremote

     This function inserts the number of commits in the current branch
     but not its push branch.


File: magit.info,  Node: Logging,  Next: Diffing,  Prev: Repository List,  Up: Inspecting

5.3 Logging
===========

The status buffer contains logs for the unpushed and unpulled commits,
but that obviously isn’t enough.  The transient prefix command
‘magit-log’, on ‘l’, features several suffix commands, which show a
specific log in a separate log buffer.

   Like other transient prefix commands, ‘magit-log’ also features
several infix arguments that can be changed before invoking one of the
suffix commands.  However, in the case of the log transient, these
arguments may be taken from those currently in use in the current
repository’s log buffer, depending on the value of
‘magit-prefix-use-buffer-arguments’ (see *note Transient Arguments and
Buffer Variables::).

   For information about the various arguments, see *note
(gitman)git-log::.

   The switch ‘++order=VALUE’ is converted to one of
‘--author-date-order’, ‘--date-order’, or ‘--topo-order’ before being
passed to ‘git log’.

   The log transient also features several reflog commands.  See *note
Reflog::.

‘l’     (‘magit-log’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘l l’     (‘magit-log-current’)

     Show log for the current branch.  When ‘HEAD’ is detached or with a
     prefix argument, show log for one or more revs read from the
     minibuffer.

‘l o’     (‘magit-log-other’)

     Show log for one or more revs read from the minibuffer.  The user
     can input any revision or revisions separated by a space, or even
     ranges, but only branches, tags, and a representation of the commit
     at point are available as completion candidates.

‘l h’     (‘magit-log-head’)

     Show log for ‘HEAD’.

‘l L’     (‘magit-log-branches’)

     Show log for all local branches and ‘HEAD’.

‘l b’     (‘magit-log-all-branches’)

     Show log for all local and remote branches and ‘HEAD’.

‘l a’     (‘magit-log-all’)

     Show log for all references and ‘HEAD’.

   Two additional commands that show the log for the file or blob that
is being visited in the current buffer exists, see *note Minor Mode for
Buffers Visiting Files::.  The command ‘magit-cherry’ also shows a log,
see *note Cherries::.

* Menu:

* Refreshing Logs::
* Log Buffer::
* Log Margin::
* Select from Log::
* Reflog::
* Cherries::


File: magit.info,  Node: Refreshing Logs,  Next: Log Buffer,  Up: Logging

5.3.1 Refreshing Logs
---------------------

The transient prefix command ‘magit-log-refresh’, on ‘L’, can be used to
change the log arguments used in the current buffer, without changing
which log is shown.  This works in dedicated log buffers, but also in
the status buffer.

‘L’     (‘magit-log-refresh’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘L g’     (‘magit-log-refresh’)

     This suffix command sets the local log arguments for the current
     buffer.

‘L s’     (‘magit-log-set-default-arguments’)

     This suffix command sets the default log arguments for buffers of
     the same type as that of the current buffer.  Other existing
     buffers of the same type are not affected because their local
     values have already been initialized.

‘L w’     (‘magit-log-save-default-arguments’)

     This suffix command sets the default log arguments for buffers of
     the same type as that of the current buffer, and saves the value
     for future sessions.  Other existing buffers of the same type are
     not affected because their local values have already been
     initialized.

‘L t’     (‘magit-toggle-margin’)

     Show or hide the margin.


File: magit.info,  Node: Log Buffer,  Next: Log Margin,  Prev: Refreshing Logs,  Up: Logging

5.3.2 Log Buffer
----------------

‘L’     (‘magit-log-refresh’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

     See *note Refreshing Logs::.

‘q’     (‘magit-log-bury-buffer’)

     Bury the current buffer or the revision buffer in the same frame.
     Like ‘magit-mode-bury-buffer’ (which see) but with a negative
     prefix argument instead bury the revision buffer, provided it is
     displayed in the current frame.

‘C-c C-b’     (‘magit-go-backward’)

     Move backward in current buffer’s history.

‘C-c C-f’     (‘magit-go-forward’)

     Move forward in current buffer’s history.

‘C-c C-n’     (‘magit-log-move-to-parent’)

     Move to a parent of the current commit.  By default, this is the
     first parent, but a numeric prefix can be used to specify another
     parent.

‘SPC’     (‘magit-diff-show-or-scroll-up’)

     Update the commit or diff buffer for the thing at point.

     Either show the commit or stash at point in the appropriate buffer,
     or if that buffer is already being displayed in the current frame
     and contains information about that commit or stash, then instead
     scroll the buffer up.  If there is no commit or stash at point,
     then prompt for a commit.

‘DEL’     (‘magit-diff-show-or-scroll-down’)

     Update the commit or diff buffer for the thing at point.

     Either show the commit or stash at point in the appropriate buffer,
     or if that buffer is already being displayed in the current frame
     and contains information about that commit or stash, then instead
     scroll the buffer down.  If there is no commit or stash at point,
     then prompt for a commit.

‘=’     (‘magit-log-toggle-commit-limit’)

     Toggle the number of commits the current log buffer is limited to.
     If the number of commits is currently limited, then remove that
     limit.  Otherwise set it to 256.

‘+’     (‘magit-log-double-commit-limit’)

     Double the number of commits the current log buffer is limited to.

‘-’     (‘magit-log-half-commit-limit’)

     Half the number of commits the current log buffer is limited to.

 -- User Option: magit-log-auto-more

     Insert more log entries automatically when moving past the last
     entry.  Only considered when moving past the last entry with
     ‘magit-goto-*-section’ commands.

 -- User Option: magit-log-show-refname-after-summary

     Whether to show the refnames after the commit summaries.  This is
     useful if you use really long branch names.

   Magit displays references in logs a bit differently from how Git does
it.

   Local branches are blue and remote branches are green.  Of course
that depends on the used theme, as do the colors used for other types of
references.  The current branch has a box around it, as do remote
branches that are their respective remote’s ‘HEAD’ branch.

   If a local branch and its push-target point at the same commit, then
their names are combined to preserve space and to make that relationship
visible.  For example:

     origin/feature
     [green][blue-]

     instead of

     feature origin/feature
     [blue-] [green-------]

   Also note that while the transient features the ‘--show-signature’
argument, that won’t actually be used when enabled, because Magit
defaults to use just one line per commit.  Instead the commit colorized
to indicate the validity of the signed commit object, using the faces
named ‘magit-signature-*’ (which see).

   For a description of ‘magit-log-margin’ see *note Log Margin::.


File: magit.info,  Node: Log Margin,  Next: Select from Log,  Prev: Log Buffer,  Up: Logging

5.3.3 Log Margin
----------------

In buffers which show one or more logs, it is possible to show
additional information about each commit in the margin.  The options
used to configure the margin are named ‘magit-INFIX-margin’, where INFIX
is the same as in the respective major-mode ‘magit-INFIX-mode’.  In
regular log buffers that would be ‘magit-log-margin’.

 -- User Option: magit-log-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     Magit-Log mode buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.

   You can change the STYLE and AUTHOR-WIDTH of all ‘magit-INFIX-margin’
options to the same values by customizing ‘magit-log-margin’ *before*
‘magit’ is loaded.  If you do that, then the respective values for the
other options will default to what you have set for that variable.
Likewise if you set INIT in ‘magit-log-margin’ to ‘nil’, then that is
used in the default of all other options.  But setting it to ‘t’, i.e.
re-enforcing the default for that option, does not carry to other
options.

 -- User Option: magit-log-margin-show-committer-date

     This option specifies whether to show the committer date in the
     margin.  This option only controls whether the committer date is
     displayed instead of the author date.  Whether some date is
     displayed in the margin and whether the margin is displayed at all
     is controlled by other options.

‘L’     (‘magit-margin-settings’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands,
     each of which changes the appearance of the margin in some way.

   In some buffers that support the margin, ‘L’ is instead bound to
‘magit-log-refresh’, but that transient features the same commands, and
then some other unrelated commands.

‘L L’     (‘magit-toggle-margin’)

     This command shows or hides the margin.

‘L l’     (‘magit-cycle-margin-style’)

     This command cycles the style used for the margin.

‘L d’     (‘magit-toggle-margin-details’)

     This command shows or hides details in the margin.


File: magit.info,  Node: Select from Log,  Next: Reflog,  Prev: Log Margin,  Up: Logging

5.3.4 Select from Log
---------------------

When the user has to select a recent commit that is reachable from
‘HEAD’, using regular completion would be inconvenient (because most
humans cannot remember hashes or "HEAD~5", at least not without double
checking).  Instead a log buffer is used to select the commit, which has
the advantage that commits are presented in order and with the commit
message.

   Such selection logs are used when selecting the beginning of a rebase
and when selecting the commit to be squashed into.

   In addition to the key bindings available in all log buffers, the
following additional key bindings are available in selection log
buffers:

‘C-c C-c’     (‘magit-log-select-pick’)

     Select the commit at point and act on it.  Call
     ‘magit-log-select-pick-function’ with the selected commit as
     argument.

‘C-c C-k’     (‘magit-log-select-quit’)

     Abort selecting a commit, don’t act on any commit.

 -- User Option: magit-log-select-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     Magit-Log-Select mode buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.


File: magit.info,  Node: Reflog,  Next: Cherries,  Prev: Select from Log,  Up: Logging

5.3.5 Reflog
------------

Also see *note (gitman)git-reflog::.

   These reflog commands are available from the log transient.  See
*note Logging::.

‘l r’     (‘magit-reflog-current’)

     Display the reflog of the current branch.

‘l O’     (‘magit-reflog-other’)

     Display the reflog of a branch or another ref.

‘l H’     (‘magit-reflog-head’)

     Display the ‘HEAD’ reflog.

 -- User Option: magit-reflog-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     Magit-Reflog mode buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.


File: magit.info,  Node: Cherries,  Prev: Reflog,  Up: Logging

5.3.6 Cherries
--------------

Cherries are commits that haven’t been applied upstream (yet), and are
usually visualized using a log.  Each commit is prefixed with ‘-’ if it
has an equivalent in the upstream and ‘+’ if it does not, i.e.  if it is
a cherry.

   The command ‘magit-cherry’ shows cherries for a single branch, but
the references buffer (see *note References Buffer::) can show cherries
for multiple "upstreams" at once.

   Also see *note (gitman)git-reflog::.

‘Y’     (‘magit-cherry’)

     Show commits that are in a certain branch but that have not been
     merged in the upstream branch.

 -- User Option: magit-cherry-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     Magit-Cherry mode buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.


File: magit.info,  Node: Diffing,  Next: Ediffing,  Prev: Logging,  Up: Inspecting

5.4 Diffing
===========

The status buffer contains diffs for the staged and unstaged commits,
but that obviously isn’t enough.  The transient prefix command
‘magit-diff’, on ‘d’, features several suffix commands, which show a
specific diff in a separate diff buffer.

   Like other transient prefix commands, ‘magit-diff’ also features
several infix arguments that can be changed before invoking one of the
suffix commands.  However, in the case of the diff transient, these
arguments may be taken from those currently in use in the current
repository’s diff buffer, depending on the value of
‘magit-prefix-use-buffer-arguments’ (see *note Transient Arguments and
Buffer Variables::).

   Also see *note (gitman)git-diff::.

‘d’     (‘magit-diff’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘d d’     (‘magit-diff-dwim’)

     Show changes for the thing at point.

‘d r’     (‘magit-diff-range’)

     Show differences between two commits.

     RANGE should be a range (A..B or A...B) but can also be a single
     commit.  If one side of the range is omitted, then it defaults to
     ‘HEAD’.  If just a commit is given, then changes in the working
     tree relative to that commit are shown.

     If the region is active, use the revisions on the first and last
     line of the region.  With a prefix argument, instead of diffing the
     revisions, choose a revision to view changes along, starting at the
     common ancestor of both revisions (i.e., use a "..." range).

‘d w’     (‘magit-diff-working-tree’)

     Show changes between the current working tree and the ‘HEAD’
     commit.  With a prefix argument show changes between the working
     tree and a commit read from the minibuffer.

‘d s’     (‘magit-diff-staged’)

     Show changes between the index and the ‘HEAD’ commit.  With a
     prefix argument show changes between the index and a commit read
     from the minibuffer.

‘d u’     (‘magit-diff-unstaged’)

     Show changes between the working tree and the index.

‘d p’     (‘magit-diff-paths’)

     Show changes between any two files on disk.

   All of the above suffix commands update the repository’s diff buffer.
The diff transient also features two commands which show differences in
another buffer:

‘d c’     (‘magit-show-commit’)

     Show the commit at point.  If there is no commit at point or with a
     prefix argument, prompt for a commit.

‘d t’     (‘magit-stash-show’)

     Show all diffs of a stash in a buffer.

   Two additional commands that show the diff for the file or blob that
is being visited in the current buffer exists, see *note Minor Mode for
Buffers Visiting Files::.

* Menu:

* Refreshing Diffs::
* Commands Available in Diffs::
* Diff Options::
* Revision Buffer::


File: magit.info,  Node: Refreshing Diffs,  Next: Commands Available in Diffs,  Up: Diffing

5.4.1 Refreshing Diffs
----------------------

The transient prefix command ‘magit-diff-refresh’, on ‘D’, can be used
to change the diff arguments used in the current buffer, without
changing which diff is shown.  This works in dedicated diff buffers, but
also in the status buffer.

‘D’     (‘magit-diff-refresh’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘D g’     (‘magit-diff-refresh’)

     This suffix command sets the local diff arguments for the current
     buffer.

‘D s’     (‘magit-diff-set-default-arguments’)

     This suffix command sets the default diff arguments for buffers of
     the same type as that of the current buffer.  Other existing
     buffers of the same type are not affected because their local
     values have already been initialized.

‘D w’     (‘magit-diff-save-default-arguments’)

     This suffix command sets the default diff arguments for buffers of
     the same type as that of the current buffer, and saves the value
     for future sessions.  Other existing buffers of the same type are
     not affected because their local values have already been
     initialized.

‘D t’     (‘magit-diff-toggle-refine-hunk’)

     This command toggles hunk refinement on or off.

‘D r’     (‘magit-diff-switch-range-type’)

     This command converts the diff range type from "revA..revB" to
     "revB...revA", or vice versa.

‘D f’     (‘magit-diff-flip-revs’)

     This command swaps revisions in the diff range from "revA..revB" to
     "revB..revA", or vice versa.

‘D F’     (‘magit-diff-toggle-file-filter’)

     This command toggles the file restriction of the diffs in the
     current buffer, allowing you to quickly switch between viewing all
     the changes in the commit and the restricted subset.  As a special
     case, when this command is called from a log buffer, it toggles the
     file restriction in the repository’s revision buffer, which is
     useful when you display a revision from a log buffer that is
     restricted to a file or files.

   In addition to the above transient, which allows changing any of the
supported arguments, there also exist some commands that change only a
particular argument.

‘-’     (‘magit-diff-less-context’)

     This command decreases the context for diff hunks by COUNT lines.

‘+’     (‘magit-diff-more-context’)

     This command increases the context for diff hunks by COUNT lines.

‘0’     (‘magit-diff-default-context’)

     This command resets the context for diff hunks to the default
     height.

   The following commands quickly change what diff is being displayed
without having to using one of the diff transient.

‘C-c C-d’     (‘magit-diff-while-committing’)

     While committing, this command shows the changes that are about to
     be committed.  While amending, invoking the command again toggles
     between showing just the new changes or all the changes that will
     be committed.

     This binding is available in the diff buffer as well as the commit
     message buffer.

‘C-c C-b’     (‘magit-go-backward’)

     This command moves backward in current buffer’s history.

‘C-c C-f’     (‘magit-go-forward’)

     This command moves forward in current buffer’s history.


File: magit.info,  Node: Commands Available in Diffs,  Next: Diff Options,  Prev: Refreshing Diffs,  Up: Diffing

5.4.2 Commands Available in Diffs
---------------------------------

Some commands are only available if point is inside a diff.

   ‘magit-diff-visit-file’ and related commands visit the appropriate
version of the file that the diff at point is about.  Likewise
‘magit-diff-visit-worktree-file’ and related commands visit the worktree
version of the file that the diff at point is about.  See *note Visiting
Files and Blobs from a Diff:: for more information and the key bindings.

‘C-c C-t’     (‘magit-diff-trace-definition’)

     This command shows a log for the definition at point.

 -- User Option: magit-log-trace-definition-function

     The function specified by this option is used by
     ‘magit-log-trace-definition’ to determine the function at point.
     For major-modes that have special needs, you could set the local
     value using the mode’s hook.

‘C-c C-e’     (‘magit-diff-edit-hunk-commit’)

     From a hunk, this command edits the respective commit and visits
     the file.

     First it visits the file being modified by the hunk at the correct
     location using ‘magit-diff-visit-file’.  This actually visits a
     blob.  When point is on a diff header, not within an individual
     hunk, then this visits the blob the first hunk is about.

     Then it invokes ‘magit-edit-line-commit’, which uses an interactive
     rebase to make the commit editable, or if that is not possible
     because the commit is not reachable from ‘HEAD’ by checking out
     that commit directly.  This also causes the actual worktree file to
     be visited.

     Neither the blob nor the file buffer are killed when finishing the
     rebase.  If that is undesirable, then it might be better to use
     ‘magit-rebase-edit-command’ instead of this command.

‘j’     (‘magit-jump-to-diffstat-or-diff’)

     This command jumps to the diffstat or diff.  When point is on a
     file inside the diffstat section, then jump to the respective diff
     section.  Otherwise, jump to the diffstat section or a child
     thereof.

   The next two commands are not specific to Magit-Diff mode (or and
Magit buffer for that matter), but it might be worth pointing out that
they are available here too.

‘SPC’     (‘scroll-up’)

     This command scrolls text upward.

‘DEL’     (‘scroll-down’)

     This command scrolls text downward.


File: magit.info,  Node: Diff Options,  Next: Revision Buffer,  Prev: Commands Available in Diffs,  Up: Diffing

5.4.3 Diff Options
------------------

 -- User Option: magit-diff-refine-hunk

     Whether to show word-granularity differences within diff hunks.

        • ‘nil’ Never show fine differences.

        • ‘t’ Show fine differences for the current diff hunk only.

        • ‘all’ Show fine differences for all displayed diff hunks.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-refine-ignore-whitespace

     Whether to ignore whitespace changes in word-granularity
     differences.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-adjust-tab-width

     Whether to adjust the width of tabs in diffs.

     Determining the correct width can be expensive if it requires
     opening large and/or many files, so the widths are cached in the
     variable ‘magit-diff--tab-width-cache’.  Set that to nil to
     invalidate the cache.

        • ‘nil’ Never adjust tab width.  Use ‘tab-width’s value from the
          Magit buffer itself instead.

        • ‘t’ If the corresponding file-visiting buffer exits, then use
          ‘tab-width’’s value from that buffer.  Doing this is cheap, so
          this value is used even if a corresponding cache entry exists.

        • ‘always’ If there is no such buffer, then temporarily visit
          the file to determine the value.

        • NUMBER Like ‘always’, but don’t visit files larger than NUMBER
          bytes.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-paint-whitespace

     Specify where to highlight whitespace errors.

     See ‘magit-diff-highlight-trailing’,
     ‘magit-diff-highlight-indentation’.  The symbol ‘t’ means in all
     diffs, ‘status’ means only in the status buffer, and nil means
     nowhere.

        • ‘nil’ Never highlight whitespace errors.

        • ‘t’ Highlight whitespace errors everywhere.

        • ‘uncommitted’ Only highlight whitespace errors in diffs
          showing uncommitted changes.  For backward compatibility
          ‘status’ is treated as a synonym.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-paint-whitespace-lines

     Specify in what kind of lines to highlight whitespace errors.

        • ‘t’ Highlight only in added lines.

        • ‘both’ Highlight in added and removed lines.

        • ‘all’ Highlight in added, removed and context lines.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-highlight-trailing

     Whether to highlight whitespace at the end of a line in diffs.
     Used only when ‘magit-diff-paint-whitespace’ is non-nil.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-highlight-indentation

     This option controls whether to highlight the indentation in case
     it used the "wrong" indentation style.  Indentation is only
     highlighted if ‘magit-diff-paint-whitespace’ is also non-nil.

     The value is an alist of the form ‘((REGEXP . INDENT)...)’.  The
     path to the current repository is matched against each element in
     reverse order.  Therefore if a REGEXP matches, then earlier
     elements are not tried.

     If the used INDENT is ‘tabs’, highlight indentation with tabs.  If
     INDENT is an integer, highlight indentation with at least that many
     spaces.  Otherwise, highlight neither.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-hide-trailing-cr-characters

     Whether to hide ^M characters at the end of a line in diffs.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-highlight-hunk-region-functions

     This option specifies the functions used to highlight the
     hunk-internal region.

     ‘magit-diff-highlight-hunk-region-dim-outside’ overlays the outside
     of the hunk internal selection with a face that causes the added
     and removed lines to have the same background color as context
     lines.  This function should not be removed from the value of this
     option.

     ‘magit-diff-highlight-hunk-region-using-overlays’ and
     ‘magit-diff-highlight-hunk-region-using-underline’ emphasize the
     region by placing delimiting horizontal lines before and after it.
     Both of these functions have glitches which cannot be fixed due to
     limitations of Emacs’ display engine.  For more information see
     <https://github.com/magit/magit/issues/2758> ff.

     Instead of, or in addition to, using delimiting horizontal lines,
     to emphasize the boundaries, you may which to emphasize the text
     itself, using ‘magit-diff-highlight-hunk-region-using-face’.

     In terminal frames it’s not possible to draw lines as the overlay
     and underline variants normally do, so there they fall back to
     calling the face function instead.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-unmarked-lines-keep-foreground

     This option controls whether added and removed lines outside the
     hunk-internal region only lose their distinct background color or
     also the foreground color.  Whether the outside of the region is
     dimmed at all depends on
     ‘magit-diff-highlight-hunk-region-functions’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Revision Buffer,  Prev: Diff Options,  Up: Diffing

5.4.4 Revision Buffer
---------------------

 -- User Option: magit-revision-insert-related-refs

     Whether to show related branches in revision buffers.

        • ‘nil’ Don’t show any related branches.

        • ‘t’ Show related local branches.

        • ‘all’ Show related local and remote branches.

        • ‘mixed’ Show all containing branches and local merged
          branches.

 -- User Option: magit-revision-show-gravatars

     Whether to show gravatar images in revision buffers.

     If ‘nil’, then don’t insert any gravatar images.  If ‘t’, then
     insert both images.  If ‘author’ or ‘committer’, then insert only
     the respective image.

     If you have customized the option ‘magit-revision-headers-format’
     and want to insert the images then you might also have to specify
     where to do so.  In that case the value has to be a cons-cell of
     two regular expressions.  The car specifies where to insert the
     author’s image.  The top half of the image is inserted right after
     the matched text, the bottom half on the next line in the same
     column.  The cdr specifies where to insert the committer’s image,
     accordingly.  Either the car or the cdr may be nil."

 -- User Option: magit-revision-use-hash-sections

     Whether to turn hashes inside the commit message into sections.

     If non-nil, then hashes inside the commit message are turned into
     ‘commit’ sections.  There is a trade off to be made between
     performance and reliability:

        • ‘slow’ calls git for every word to be absolutely sure.

        • ‘quick’ skips words less than seven characters long.

        • ‘quicker’ additionally skips words that don’t contain a
          number.

        • ‘quickest’ uses all words that are at least seven characters
          long and which contain at least one number as well as at least
          one letter.

     If nil, then no hashes are turned into sections, but you can still
     visit the commit at point using "RET".

   The diffs shown in the revision buffer may be automatically
restricted to a subset of the changed files.  If the revision buffer is
displayed from a log buffer, the revision buffer will share the same
file restriction as that log buffer (also see the command
‘magit-diff-toggle-file-filter’).

 -- User Option: magit-revision-filter-files-on-follow

     Whether showing a commit from a log buffer honors the log’s file
     filter when the log arguments include ‘--follow’.

     When this option is nil, displaying a commit from a log ignores the
     log’s file filter if the log arguments include ‘--follow’.  Doing
     so avoids showing an empty diff in revision buffers for commits
     before a rename event.  In such cases, the ‘--patch’ argument of
     the log transient can be used to show the file-restricted diffs
     inline.

     Set this option to non-nil to keep the log’s file restriction even
     if ‘--follow’ is present in the log arguments.

   If the revision buffer is not displayed from a log buffer, the file
restriction is determined as usual (see *note Transient Arguments and
Buffer Variables::).


File: magit.info,  Node: Ediffing,  Next: References Buffer,  Prev: Diffing,  Up: Inspecting

5.5 Ediffing
============

This section describes how to enter Ediff from Magit buffers.  For
information on how to use Ediff itself, see *note (ediff)Top::.

‘e’     (‘magit-ediff-dwim’)

     Compare, stage, or resolve using Ediff.

     This command tries to guess what file, and what commit or range the
     user wants to compare, stage, or resolve using Ediff.  It might
     only be able to guess either the file, or range/commit, in which
     case the user is asked about the other.  It might not always guess
     right, in which case the appropriate ‘magit-ediff-*’ command has to
     be used explicitly.  If it cannot read the user’s mind at all, then
     it asks the user for a command to run.

‘E’     (‘magit-ediff’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘E r’     (‘magit-ediff-compare’)

     Compare two revisions of a file using Ediff.

     If the region is active, use the revisions on the first and last
     line of the region.  With a prefix argument, instead of diffing the
     revisions, choose a revision to view changes along, starting at the
     common ancestor of both revisions (i.e., use a "..." range).

‘E m’     (‘magit-ediff-resolve’)

     Resolve outstanding conflicts in a file using Ediff, defaulting to
     the file at point.

     Provided that the value of ‘merge.conflictstyle’ is ‘diff3’, you
     can view the file’s merge-base revision using ‘/’ in the Ediff
     control buffer.

     In the rare event that you want to manually resolve all conflicts,
     including those already resolved by Git, use
     ‘ediff-merge-revisions-with-ancestor’.

‘E s’     (‘magit-ediff-stage’)

     Stage and unstage changes to a file using Ediff, defaulting to the
     file at point.

‘E u’     (‘magit-ediff-show-unstaged’)

     Show unstaged changes to a file using Ediff.

‘E i’     (‘magit-ediff-show-staged’)

     Show staged changes to a file using Ediff.

‘E w’     (‘magit-ediff-show-working-tree’)

     Show changes in a file between ‘HEAD’ and working tree using Ediff.

‘E c’     (‘magit-ediff-show-commit’)

     Show changes to a file introduced by a commit using Ediff.

‘E z’     (‘magit-ediff-show-stash’)

     Show changes to a file introduced by a stash using Ediff.

 -- User Option: magit-ediff-dwim-show-on-hunks

     This option controls what command ‘magit-ediff-dwim’ calls when
     point is on uncommitted hunks.  When nil, always run
     ‘magit-ediff-stage’.  Otherwise, use ‘magit-ediff-show-staged’ and
     ‘magit-ediff-show-unstaged’ to show staged and unstaged changes,
     respectively.

 -- User Option: magit-ediff-show-stash-with-index

     This option controls whether ‘magit-ediff-show-stash’ includes a
     buffer containing the file’s state in the index at the time the
     stash was created.  This makes it possible to tell which changes in
     the stash were staged.

 -- User Option: magit-ediff-quit-hook

     This hook is run after quitting an Ediff session that was created
     using a Magit command.  The hook functions are run inside the Ediff
     control buffer, and should not change the current buffer.

     This is similar to ‘ediff-quit-hook’ but takes the needs of Magit
     into account.  The regular ‘ediff-quit-hook’ is ignored by Ediff
     sessions that were created using a Magit command.


File: magit.info,  Node: References Buffer,  Next: Bisecting,  Prev: Ediffing,  Up: Inspecting

5.6 References Buffer
=====================

‘y’     (‘magit-show-refs’)

     This command lists branches and tags in a dedicated buffer.

     However if this command is invoked again from this buffer or if it
     is invoked with a prefix argument, then it acts as a transient
     prefix command, which binds the following suffix commands and some
     infix arguments.

   All of the following suffix commands list exactly the same branches
and tags.  The only difference the optional feature that can be enabled
by changing the value of ‘magit-refs-show-commit-count’ (see below).
These commands specify a different branch or commit against which all
the other references are compared.

‘y y’     (‘magit-show-refs-head’)

     This command lists branches and tags in a dedicated buffer.  Each
     reference is being compared with ‘HEAD’.

‘y c’     (‘magit-show-refs-current’)

     This command lists branches and tags in a dedicated buffer.  Each
     reference is being compared with the current branch or ‘HEAD’ if it
     is detached.

‘y o’     (‘magit-show-refs-other’)

     This command lists branches and tags in a dedicated buffer.  Each
     reference is being compared with a branch read from the user.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-show-commit-count

     Whether to show commit counts in Magit-Refs mode buffers.

        • ‘all’ Show counts for branches and tags.

        • ‘branch’ Show counts for branches only.

        • ‘nil’ Never show counts.

     The default is ‘nil’ because anything else can be very expensive.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-pad-commit-counts

     Whether to pad all commit counts on all sides in Magit-Refs mode
     buffers.

     If this is nil, then some commit counts are displayed right next to
     one of the branches that appear next to the count, without any
     space in between.  This might look bad if the branch name faces
     look too similar to ‘magit-dimmed’.

     If this is non-nil, then spaces are placed on both sides of all
     commit counts.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-show-remote-prefix

     Whether to show the remote prefix in lists of remote branches.

     Showing the prefix is redundant because the name of the remote is
     already shown in the heading preceding the list of its branches.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-primary-column-width

     Width of the primary column in ‘magit-refs-mode’ buffers.  The
     primary column is the column that contains the name of the branch
     that the current row is about.

     If this is an integer, then the column is that many columns wide.
     Otherwise it has to be a cons-cell of two integers.  The first
     specifies the minimal width, the second the maximal width.  In that
     case the actual width is determined using the length of the names
     of the shown local branches.  (Remote branches and tags are not
     taken into account when calculating to optimal width.)

 -- User Option: magit-refs-focus-column-width

     Width of the focus column in ‘magit-refs-mode’ buffers.

     The focus column is the first column, which marks one branch
     (usually the current branch) as the focused branch using ‘*’ or
     ‘@’.  For each other reference, this column optionally shows how
     many commits it is ahead of the focused branch and ‘<’, or if it
     isn’t ahead then the commits it is behind and ‘>’, or if it isn’t
     behind either, then a ‘=’.

     This column may also display only ‘*’ or ‘@’ for the focused
     branch, in which case this option is ignored.  Use ‘L v’ to change
     the verbosity of this column.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     Magit-Refs mode buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-margin-for-tags

     This option specifies whether to show information about tags in the
     margin.  This is disabled by default because it is slow if there
     are many tags.

   The following variables control how individual refs are displayed.
If you change one of these variables (especially the "%c" part), then
you should also change the others to keep things aligned.  The following
%-sequences are supported:

   • ‘%a’ Number of commits this ref has over the one we compare to.

   • ‘%b’ Number of commits the ref we compare to has over this one.

   • ‘%c’ Number of commits this ref has over the one we compare to.
     For the ref which all other refs are compared this is instead "@",
     if it is the current branch, or "#" otherwise.

   • ‘%C’ For the ref which all other refs are compared this is "@", if
     it is the current branch, or "#" otherwise.  For all other refs "
     ".

   • ‘%h’ Hash of this ref’s tip.

   • ‘%m’ Commit summary of the tip of this ref.

   • ‘%n’ Name of this ref.

   • ‘%u’ Upstream of this local branch.

   • ‘%U’ Upstream of this local branch and additional local vs.
     upstream information.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-filter-alist

     The purpose of this option is to forgo displaying certain refs
     based on their name.  If you want to not display any refs of a
     certain type, then you should remove the appropriate function from
     ‘magit-refs-sections-hook’ instead.

     This alist controls which tags and branches are omitted from being
     displayed in ‘magit-refs-mode’ buffers.  If it is ‘nil’, then all
     refs are displayed (subject to ‘magit-refs-sections-hook’).

     All keys are tried in order until one matches.  Then its value is
     used and subsequent elements are ignored.  If the value is non-nil,
     then the reference is displayed, otherwise it is not.  If no
     element matches, then the reference is displayed.

     A key can either be a regular expression that the refname has to
     match, or a function that takes the refname as only argument and
     returns a boolean.  A remote branch such as "origin/master" is
     displayed as just "master", however for this comparison the former
     is used.

‘RET’     (‘magit-visit-ref’)

     This command visits the reference or revision at point in another
     buffer.  If there is no revision at point or with a prefix argument
     then it prompts for a revision.

     This command behaves just like ‘magit-show-commit’ as described
     above, except if point is on a reference in a ‘magit-refs-mode’
     buffer, in which case the behavior may be different, but only if
     you have customized the option ‘magit-visit-ref-behavior’.

 -- User Option: magit-visit-ref-behavior

     This option controls how ‘magit-visit-ref’ behaves in
     ‘magit-refs-mode’ buffers.

     By default ‘magit-visit-ref’ behaves like ‘magit-show-commit’, in
     all buffers, including ‘magit-refs-mode’ buffers.  When the type of
     the section at point is ‘commit’ then "RET" is bound to
     ‘magit-show-commit’, and when the type is either ‘branch’ or ‘tag’
     then it is bound to ‘magit-visit-ref’.

     "RET" is one of Magit’s most essential keys and at least by default
     it should behave consistently across all of Magit, especially
     because users quickly learn that it does something very harmless;
     it shows more information about the thing at point in another
     buffer.

     However "RET" used to behave differently in ‘magit-refs-mode’
     buffers, doing surprising things, some of which cannot really be
     described as "visit this thing".  If you’ve grown accustomed this
     behavior, you can restore it by adding one or more of the below
     symbols to the value of this option.  But keep in mind that by
     doing so you don’t only introduce inconsistencies, you also lose
     some functionality and might have to resort to ‘M-x
     magit-show-commit’ to get it back.

     ‘magit-visit-ref’ looks for these symbols in the order in which
     they are described here.  If the presence of a symbol applies to
     the current situation, then the symbols that follow do not affect
     the outcome.

        • ‘focus-on-ref’

          With a prefix argument update the buffer to show commit counts
          and lists of cherry commits relative to the reference at point
          instead of relative to the current buffer or ‘HEAD’.

          Instead of adding this symbol, consider pressing "C-u y o
          RET".

        • ‘create-branch’

          If point is on a remote branch, then create a new local branch
          with the same name, use the remote branch as its upstream, and
          then check out the local branch.

          Instead of adding this symbol, consider pressing "b c RET
          RET", like you would do in other buffers.

        • ‘checkout-any’

          Check out the reference at point.  If that reference is a tag
          or a remote branch, then this results in a detached ‘HEAD’.

          Instead of adding this symbol, consider pressing "b b RET",
          like you would do in other buffers.

        • ‘checkout-branch’

          Check out the local branch at point.

          Instead of adding this symbol, consider pressing "b b RET",
          like you would do in other buffers.

* Menu:

* References Sections::


File: magit.info,  Node: References Sections,  Up: References Buffer

5.6.1 References Sections
-------------------------

The contents of references buffers is controlled using the hook
‘magit-refs-sections-hook’.  See *note Section Hooks:: to learn about
such hooks and how to customize them.  All of the below functions are
members of the default value.  Note that it makes much less sense to
customize this hook than it does for the respective hook used for the
status buffer.

 -- User Option: magit-refs-sections-hook

     Hook run to insert sections into a references buffer.

 -- Function: magit-insert-local-branches

     Insert sections showing all local branches.

 -- Function: magit-insert-remote-branches

     Insert sections showing all remote-tracking branches.

 -- Function: magit-insert-tags

     Insert sections showing all tags.


File: magit.info,  Node: Bisecting,  Next: Visiting Files and Blobs,  Prev: References Buffer,  Up: Inspecting

5.7 Bisecting
=============

Also see *note (gitman)git-bisect::.

‘B’     (‘magit-bisect’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   When bisecting is not in progress, then the transient features the
following suffix commands.

‘B B’     (‘magit-bisect-start’)

     Start a bisect session.

     Bisecting a bug means to find the commit that introduced it.  This
     command starts such a bisect session by asking for a known good and
     a bad commit.

‘B s’     (‘magit-bisect-run’)

     Bisect automatically by running commands after each step.

   When bisecting in progress, then the transient instead features the
following suffix commands.

‘B b’     (‘magit-bisect-bad’)

     Mark the current commit as bad.  Use this after you have asserted
     that the commit does contain the bug in question.

‘B g’     (‘magit-bisect-good’)

     Mark the current commit as good.  Use this after you have asserted
     that the commit does not contain the bug in question.

‘B k’     (‘magit-bisect-skip’)

     Skip the current commit.  Use this if for some reason the current
     commit is not a good one to test.  This command lets Git choose a
     different one.

‘B r’     (‘magit-bisect-reset’)

     After bisecting, cleanup bisection state and return to original
     ‘HEAD’.

   By default the status buffer shows information about the ongoing
bisect session.

 -- User Option: magit-bisect-show-graph

     This option controls whether a graph is displayed for the log of
     commits that still have to be bisected.


File: magit.info,  Node: Visiting Files and Blobs,  Next: Blaming,  Prev: Bisecting,  Up: Inspecting

5.8 Visiting Files and Blobs
============================

Magit provides several commands that visit a file or blob (the version
of a file that is stored in a certain commit).  Actually it provides
several *groups* of such commands and the several *variants* within each
group.

* Menu:

* General-Purpose Visit Commands::
* Visiting Files and Blobs from a Diff::


File: magit.info,  Node: General-Purpose Visit Commands,  Next: Visiting Files and Blobs from a Diff,  Up: Visiting Files and Blobs

5.8.1 General-Purpose Visit Commands
------------------------------------

These commands can be used anywhere to open any blob.  Currently no keys
are bound to these commands by default, but that is likely to change.

 -- Command: magit-find-file

     This command reads a filename and revision from the user and visits
     the respective blob in a buffer.  The buffer is displayed in the
     selected window.

 -- Command: magit-find-file-other-window

     This command reads a filename and revision from the user and visits
     the respective blob in a buffer.  The buffer is displayed in
     another window.

 -- Command: magit-find-file-other-frame

     This command reads a filename and revision from the user and visits
     the respective blob in a buffer.  The buffer is displayed in
     another frame.


File: magit.info,  Node: Visiting Files and Blobs from a Diff,  Prev: General-Purpose Visit Commands,  Up: Visiting Files and Blobs

5.8.2 Visiting Files and Blobs from a Diff
------------------------------------------

These commands can only be used when point is inside a diff.

‘RET’     (‘magit-diff-visit-file’)

     This command visits the appropriate version of the file that the
     diff at point is about.

     This commands visits the worktree version of the appropriate file.
     The location of point inside the diff determines which file is
     being visited.  The visited version depends on what changes the
     diff is about.

        • If the diff shows uncommitted changes (i.e.  staged or
          unstaged changes), then visit the file in the working tree
          (i.e.  the same "real" file that ‘find-file’ would visit.  In
          all other cases visit a "blob" (i.e.  the version of a file as
          stored in some commit).

        • If point is on a removed line, then visit the blob for the
          first parent of the commit that removed that line, i.e.  the
          last commit where that line still exists.

        • If point is on an added or context line, then visit the blob
          that adds that line, or if the diff shows from more than a
          single commit, then visit the blob from the last of these
          commits.

     In the file-visiting buffer this command goes to the line that
     corresponds to the line that point is on in the diff.

     The buffer is displayed in the selected window.  With a prefix
     argument the buffer is displayed in another window instead.

 -- User Option: magit-diff-visit-previous-blob

     This option controls whether ‘magit-diff-visit-file’ may visit the
     previous blob.  When this is ‘t’ (the default) and point is on a
     removed line in a diff for a committed change, then
     ‘magit-diff-visit-file’ visits the blob from the last revision
     which still had that line.

     Currently this is only supported for committed changes, for staged
     and unstaged changes ‘magit-diff-visit-file’ always visits the file
     in the working tree.

‘C-<return>’     (‘magit-diff-visit-file-worktree’)

     This command visits the worktree version of the appropriate file.
     The location of point inside the diff determines which file is
     being visited.  Unlike ‘magit-diff-visit-file’ it always visits the
     "real" file in the working tree, i.e the "current version" of the
     file.

     In the file-visiting buffer this command goes to the line that
     corresponds to the line that point is on in the diff.  Lines that
     were added or removed in the working tree, the index and other
     commits in between are automatically accounted for.

     The buffer is displayed in the selected window.  With a prefix
     argument the buffer is displayed in another window instead.

   Variants of the above two commands exist that instead visit the file
in another window or in another frame.  If you prefer such behavior,
then you may want to change the above key bindings, but note that the
above commands also use another window when invoked with a prefix
argument.

 -- Command: magit-diff-visit-file-other-window
 -- Command: magit-diff-visit-file-other-frame
 -- Command: magit-diff-visit-worktree-file-other-window
 -- Command: magit-diff-visit-worktree-file-other-frame


File: magit.info,  Node: Blaming,  Prev: Visiting Files and Blobs,  Up: Inspecting

5.9 Blaming
===========

Also see *note (gitman)git-blame::.

   To start blaming invoke the ‘magit-file-dispatch’ transient prefix
command by pressing ‘C-c M-g’.  (This is only the default binding and
the recommended binding is ‘C-c g’.  Also neither binding may be
available if you disabled ‘global-magit-file-mode’.  Also see *note
Minor Mode for Buffers Visiting Files::.)

   The blaming suffix commands can be invoked from the dispatch
transient.  However if you want to set an infix argument, then you have
to enter the blaming sub-transient first.

   The key bindings shown below assume that you enter the dispatch
transient using the default binding.

‘C-c M-g B’     (‘magit-blame’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   Note that not all of the following suffixes are available at all
times.  For example if ‘magit-blame-mode’ is not enabled, then the
command whose purpose is to turn off that mode would not be of any use
and therefore isn’t available.

‘C-c M-g b’     (‘magit-blame-addition’)
‘C-c M-g B b’     (‘magit-blame-addition’)

     This command augments each line or chunk of lines in the current
     file-visiting or blob-visiting buffer with information about what
     commits last touched these lines.

     If the buffer visits a revision of that file, then history up to
     that revision is considered.  Otherwise, the file’s full history is
     considered, including uncommitted changes.

     If Magit-Blame mode is already turned on in the current buffer then
     blaming is done recursively, by visiting REVISION:FILE (using
     ‘magit-find-file’), where REVISION is a parent of the revision that
     added the current line or chunk of lines.

‘C-c M-g r’     (‘magit-blame-removal’)
‘C-c M-g B r’     (‘magit-blame-removal’)

     This command augments each line or chunk of lines in the current
     blob-visiting buffer with information about the revision that
     removes it.  It cannot be used in file-visiting buffers.

     Like ‘magit-blame-addition’, this command can be used recursively.

‘C-c M-g f’     (‘magit-blame-reverse’)
‘C-c M-g B f’     (‘magit-blame-reverse’)

     This command augments each line or chunk of lines in the current
     file-visiting or blob-visiting buffer with information about the
     last revision in which a line still existed.

     Like ‘magit-blame-addition’, this command can be used recursively.

‘C-c M-g e’     (‘magit-blame-echo’)
‘C-c M-g B e’     (‘magit-blame-echo’)

     This command is like ‘magit-blame-addition’ except that it doesn’t
     turn on ‘read-only-mode’ and that it initially uses the
     visualization style specified by option ‘magit-blame-echo-style’.

   The following key bindings are available when Magit-Blame mode is
enabled and Read-Only mode is not enabled.  These commands are also
available in other buffers; here only the behavior is described that is
relevant in file-visiting buffers that are being blamed.

‘RET’     (‘magit-show-commit’)

     This command shows the commit that last touched the line at point.

‘SPC’     (‘magit-diff-show-or-scroll-up’)

     This command updates the commit buffer.

     This either shows the commit that last touched the line at point in
     the appropriate buffer, or if that buffer is already being
     displayed in the current frame and if that buffer contains
     information about that commit, then the buffer is scrolled up
     instead.

‘DEL’     (‘magit-diff-show-or-scroll-down’)

     This command updates the commit buffer.

     This either shows the commit that last touched the line at point in
     the appropriate buffer, or if that buffer is already being
     displayed in the current frame and if that buffer contains
     information about that commit, then the buffer is scrolled down
     instead.

   The following key bindings are available when both Magit-Blame mode
and Read-Only mode are enabled.

‘b’     (‘magit-blame’)

     See above.

‘n’     (‘magit-blame-next-chunk’)

     This command moves to the next chunk.

‘N’     (‘magit-blame-next-chunk-same-commit’)

     This command moves to the next chunk from the same commit.

‘p’     (‘magit-blame-previous-chunk’)

     This command moves to the previous chunk.

‘P’     (‘magit-blame-previous-chunk-same-commit’)

     This command moves to the previous chunk from the same commit.

‘q’     (‘magit-blame-quit’)

     This command turns off Magit-Blame mode.  If the buffer was created
     during a recursive blame, then it also kills the buffer.

‘M-w’     (‘magit-blame-copy-hash’)

     This command saves the hash of the current chunk’s commit to the
     kill ring.

     When the region is active, the command saves the region’s content
     instead of the hash, like ‘kill-ring-save’ would.

‘c’     (‘magit-blame-cycle-style’)

     This command changes how blame information is visualized in the
     current buffer by cycling through the styles specified using the
     option ‘magit-blame-styles’.

   Blaming is also controlled using the following options.

 -- User Option: magit-blame-styles

     This option defines a list of styles used to visualize blame
     information.  For now see its doc-string to learn more.

 -- User Option: magit-blame-echo-style

     This option specifies the blame visualization style used by the
     command ‘magit-blame-echo’.  This must be a symbol that is used as
     the identifier for one of the styles defined in
     ‘magit-blame-styles’.

 -- User Option: magit-blame-time-format

     This option specifies the format string used to display times when
     showing blame information.

 -- User Option: magit-blame-read-only

     This option controls whether blaming a buffer also makes
     temporarily read-only.

 -- User Option: magit-blame-disable-modes

     This option lists incompatible minor-modes that should be disabled
     temporarily when a buffer contains blame information.  They are
     enabled again when the buffer no longer shows blame information.

 -- User Option: magit-blame-goto-chunk-hook

     This hook is run when moving between chunks.


File: magit.info,  Node: Manipulating,  Next: Transferring,  Prev: Inspecting,  Up: Top

6 Manipulating
**************

* Menu:

* Creating Repository::
* Cloning Repository::
* Staging and Unstaging::
* Applying::
* Committing::
* Branching::
* Merging::
* Resolving Conflicts::
* Rebasing::
* Cherry Picking::
* Resetting::
* Stashing::


File: magit.info,  Node: Creating Repository,  Next: Cloning Repository,  Up: Manipulating

6.1 Creating Repository
=======================

‘M-x magit-init’     (‘magit-init’)

     This command initializes a repository and then shows the status
     buffer for the new repository.

     If the directory is below an existing repository, then the user has
     to confirm that a new one should be created inside.  If the
     directory is the root of the existing repository, then the user has
     to confirm that it should be reinitialized.


File: magit.info,  Node: Cloning Repository,  Next: Staging and Unstaging,  Prev: Creating Repository,  Up: Manipulating

6.2 Cloning Repository
======================

To clone a remote or local repository use ‘C’, which is bound to the
command ‘magit-clone’.  This command either act as a transient prefix
command, which binds several infix arguments and suffix commands, or it
can invoke ‘git clone’ directly, depending on whether a prefix argument
is used and on the value of ‘magit-clone-always-transient’.

 -- User Option: magit-clone-always-transient

     This option controls whether the command ‘magit-clone’ always acts
     as a transient prefix command, regardless of whether a prefix
     argument is used or not.  If ‘t’, then that command always acts as
     a transient prefix.  If ‘nil’, then a prefix argument has to be
     used for it to act as a transient.

‘C’     (‘magit-clone’)

     This command either acts as a transient prefix command as described
     above or does the same thing as ‘transient-clone-regular’ as
     described below.

     If it acts as a transient prefix, then it binds the following
     suffix commands and several infix arguments.

‘C C’     (‘magit-clone-regular’)

     This command creates a regular clone of an existing repository.
     The repository and the target directory are read from the user.

‘C s’     (‘magit-clone-shallow’)

     This command creates a shallow clone of an existing repository.
     The repository and the target directory are read from the user.  By
     default the depth of the cloned history is a single commit, but
     with a prefix argument the depth is read from the user.

‘C b’     (‘magit-clone-bare’)

     This command creates a bare clone of an existing repository.  The
     repository and the target directory are read from the user.

‘C m’     (‘magit-clone-mirror’)

     This command creates a mirror of an existing repository.  The
     repository and the target directory are read from the user.

   The following suffixes are disabled by default.  See *note
(transient)Enabling and Disabling Suffixes:: for how to enable them.

‘C d’     (‘magit-clone-shallow-since’)

     This command creates a shallow clone of an existing repository.
     Only commits that were committed after a date are cloned, which is
     read from the user.  The repository and the target directory are
     also read from the user.

‘C e’     (‘magit-clone-shallow-exclude’)

     This command creates a shallow clone of an existing repository.
     This reads a branch or tag from the user.  Commits that are
     reachable from that are not cloned.  The repository and the target
     directory are also read from the user.

 -- User Option: magit-clone-set-remote-head

     This option controls whether cloning causes the reference
     ‘refs/remotes/<remote>/HEAD’ to be created in the clone.  The
     default is to delete the reference after running ‘git clone’, which
     insists on creating it.  This is because the reference has not been
     found to be particularly useful as it is not automatically updated
     when the ‘HEAD’ of the remote changes.  Setting this option to ‘t’
     preserves Git’s default behavior of creating the reference.

 -- User Option: magit-clone-set-remote.pushDefault

     This option controls whether the value of the Git variable
     ‘remote.pushDefault’ is set after cloning.

        • If ‘t’, then it is always set without asking.

        • If ‘ask’, then the users are asked every time they clone a
          repository.

        • If ‘nil’, then it is never set.

 -- User Option: magit-clone-default-directory

     This option control the default directory name used when reading
     the destination for a cloning operation.

        • If ‘nil’ (the default), then the value of ‘default-directory’
          is used.

        • If a directory, then that is used.

        • If a function, then that is called with the remote url as the
          only argument and the returned value is used.

 -- User Option: magit-clone-name-alist

     This option maps regular expressions, which match repository names,
     to repository urls, making it possible for users to enter short
     names instead of urls when cloning repositories.

     Each element has the form ‘(REGEXP HOSTNAME USER)’.  When the user
     enters a name when a cloning command asks for a name or url, then
     that is looked up in this list.  The first element whose REGEXP
     matches is used.

     The format specified by option ‘magit-clone-url-format’ is used to
     turn the name into an url, using HOSTNAME and the repository name.
     If the provided name contains a slash, then that is used.
     Otherwise if the name omits the owner of the repository, then the
     default user specified in the matched entry is used.

     If USER contains a dot, then it is treated as a Git variable and
     the value of that is used as the username.  Otherwise it is used as
     the username itself.

 -- User Option: magit-clone-url-format

     The format specified by this option is used when turning repository
     names into urls.  ‘%h’ is the hostname and ‘%n’ is the repository
     name, including the name of the owner.


File: magit.info,  Node: Staging and Unstaging,  Next: Applying,  Prev: Cloning Repository,  Up: Manipulating

6.3 Staging and Unstaging
=========================

Like Git, Magit can of course stage and unstage complete files.  Unlike
Git, it also allows users to gracefully un-/stage individual hunks and
even just part of a hunk.  To stage individual hunks and parts of hunks
using Git directly, one has to use the very modal and rather clumsy
interface of a ‘git add --interactive’ session.

   With Magit, on the other hand, one can un-/stage individual hunks by
just moving point into the respective section inside a diff displayed in
the status buffer or a separate diff buffer and typing ‘s’ or ‘u’.  To
operate on just parts of a hunk, mark the changes that should be
un-/staged using the region and then press the same key that would be
used to un-/stage.  To stage multiple files or hunks at once use a
region that starts inside the heading of such a section and ends inside
the heading of a sibling section of the same type.

   Besides staging and unstaging, Magit also provides several other
"apply variants" that can also operate on a file, multiple files at
once, a hunk, multiple hunks at once, and on parts of a hunk.  These
apply variants are described in the next section.

   You can also use Ediff to stage and unstage.  See *note Ediffing::.

‘s’     (‘magit-stage’)

     Add the change at point to the staging area.

     With a prefix argument and an untracked file (or files) at point,
     stage the file but not its content.  This makes it possible to
     stage only a subset of the new file’s changes.

‘S’     (‘magit-stage-modified’)

     Stage all changes to files modified in the worktree.  Stage all new
     content of tracked files and remove tracked files that no longer
     exist in the working tree from the index also.  With a prefix
     argument also stage previously untracked (but not ignored) files.

‘u’     (‘magit-unstage’)

     Remove the change at point from the staging area.

     Only staged changes can be unstaged.  But by default this command
     performs an action that is somewhat similar to unstaging, when it
     is called on a committed change: it reverses the change in the
     index but not in the working tree.

‘U’     (‘magit-unstage-all’)

     Remove all changes from the staging area.

 -- User Option: magit-unstage-committed

     This option controls whether ‘magit-unstage’ "unstages" committed
     changes by reversing them in the index but not the working tree.
     The alternative is to raise an error.

‘M-x magit-reverse-in-index’     (‘magit-reverse-in-index’)

     This command reverses the committed change at point in the index
     but not the working tree.  By default no key is bound directly to
     this command, but it is indirectly called when ‘u’
     (‘magit-unstage’) is pressed on a committed change.

     This allows extracting a change from ‘HEAD’, while leaving it in
     the working tree, so that it can later be committed using a
     separate commit.  A typical workflow would be:

        • Optionally make sure that there are no uncommitted changes.

        • Visit the ‘HEAD’ commit and navigate to the change that should
          not have been included in that commit.

        • Type ‘u’ (‘magit-unstage’) to reverse it in the index.  This
          assumes that ‘magit-unstage-committed-changes’ is non-nil.

        • Type ‘c e’ to extend ‘HEAD’ with the staged changes, including
          those that were already staged before.

        • Optionally stage the remaining changes using ‘s’ or ‘S’ and
          then type ‘c c’ to create a new commit.

‘M-x magit-reset-index’     (‘magit-reset-index’)

     Reset the index to some commit.  The commit is read from the user
     and defaults to the commit at point.  If there is no commit at
     point, then it defaults to ‘HEAD’.

* Menu:

* Staging from File-Visiting Buffers::


File: magit.info,  Node: Staging from File-Visiting Buffers,  Up: Staging and Unstaging

6.3.1 Staging from File-Visiting Buffers
----------------------------------------

Fine-grained un-/staging has to be done from the status or a diff
buffer, but it’s also possible to un-/stage all changes made to the file
visited in the current buffer right from inside that buffer.

‘M-x magit-stage-file’     (‘magit-stage-file’)

     When invoked inside a file-visiting buffer, then stage all changes
     to that file.  In a Magit buffer, stage the file at point if any.
     Otherwise prompt for a file to be staged.  With a prefix argument
     always prompt the user for a file, even in a file-visiting buffer
     or when there is a file section at point.

‘M-x magit-unstage-file’     (‘magit-unstage-file’)

     When invoked inside a file-visiting buffer, then unstage all
     changes to that file.  In a Magit buffer, unstage the file at point
     if any.  Otherwise prompt for a file to be unstaged.  With a prefix
     argument always prompt the user for a file, even in a file-visiting
     buffer or when there is a file section at point.


File: magit.info,  Node: Applying,  Next: Committing,  Prev: Staging and Unstaging,  Up: Manipulating

6.4 Applying
============

Magit provides several "apply variants": stage, unstage, discard,
reverse, and "regular apply".  At least when operating on a hunk they
are all implemented using ‘git apply’, which is why they are called
"apply variants".

   • Stage.  Apply a change from the working tree to the index.  The
     change also remains in the working tree.

   • Unstage.  Remove a change from the index.  The change remains in
     the working tree.

   • Discard.  On a staged change, remove it from the working tree and
     the index.  On an unstaged change, remove it from the working tree
     only.

   • Reverse.  Reverse a change in the working tree.  Both committed and
     staged changes can be reversed.  Unstaged changes cannot be
     reversed.  Discard them instead.

   • Apply.  Apply a change to the working tree.  Both committed and
     staged changes can be applied.  Unstaged changes cannot be applied
     - as they already have been applied.

   The previous section described the staging and unstaging commands.
What follows are the commands which implement the remaining apply
variants.

‘a’     (‘magit-apply’)

     Apply the change at point to the working tree.

     With a prefix argument fallback to a 3-way merge.  Doing so causes
     the change to be applied to the index as well.

‘k’     (‘magit-discard’)

     Remove the change at point from the working tree.

‘v’     (‘magit-reverse’)

     Reverse the change at point in the working tree.

     With a prefix argument fallback to a 3-way merge.  Doing so causes
     the change to be applied to the index as well.

   With a prefix argument all apply variants attempt a 3-way merge when
appropriate (i.e.  when ‘git apply’ is used internally).


File: magit.info,  Node: Committing,  Next: Branching,  Prev: Applying,  Up: Manipulating

6.5 Committing
==============

When the user initiates a commit, Magit calls ‘git commit’ without any
arguments, so Git has to get it from the user.  It creates the file
‘.git/COMMIT_EDITMSG’ and then opens that file in an editor.  Magit
arranges for that editor to be the Emacsclient.  Once the user finishes
the editing session, the Emacsclient exits and Git creates the commit
using the file’s content as message.

* Menu:

* Initiating a Commit::
* Editing Commit Messages::


File: magit.info,  Node: Initiating a Commit,  Next: Editing Commit Messages,  Up: Committing

6.5.1 Initiating a Commit
-------------------------

Also see *note (gitman)git-commit::.

‘c’     (‘magit-commit’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘c c’     (‘magit-commit-create’)

     Create a new commit on ‘HEAD’.  With a prefix argument amend to the
     commit at ‘HEAD’ instead.

‘c a’     (‘magit-commit-amend’)

     Amend the last commit.

‘c e’     (‘magit-commit-extend’)

     Amend the last commit, without editing the message.  With a prefix
     argument keep the committer date, otherwise change it.  The option
     ‘magit-commit-extend-override-date’ can be used to inverse the
     meaning of the prefix argument.

     Non-interactively respect the optional OVERRIDE-DATE argument and
     ignore the option.

‘c w’     (‘magit-commit-reword’)

     Reword the last commit, ignoring staged changes.  With a prefix
     argument keep the committer date, otherwise change it.  The option
     ‘magit-commit-reword-override-date’ can be used to inverse the
     meaning of the prefix argument.

     Non-interactively respect the optional OVERRIDE-DATE argument and
     ignore the option.

‘c f’     (‘magit-commit-fixup’)

     Create a fixup commit.

     With a prefix argument the target commit has to be confirmed.
     Otherwise the commit at point may be used without confirmation
     depending on the value of option ‘magit-commit-squash-confirm’.

‘c F’     (‘magit-commit-instant-fixup’)

     Create a fixup commit and instantly rebase.

‘c s’     (‘magit-commit-squash’)

     Create a squash commit, without editing the squash message.

     With a prefix argument the target commit has to be confirmed.
     Otherwise the commit at point may be used without confirmation
     depending on the value of option ‘magit-commit-squash-confirm’.

‘c S’     (‘magit-commit-instant-squash’)

     Create a squash commit and instantly rebase.

‘c A’     (‘magit-commit-augment’)

     Create a squash commit, editing the squash message.

     With a prefix argument the target commit has to be confirmed.
     Otherwise the commit at point may be used without confirmation
     depending on the value of option ‘magit-commit-squash-confirm’.

 -- User Option: magit-commit-ask-to-stage

     Whether to ask to stage all unstaged changes when committing and
     nothing is staged.

 -- User Option: magit-commit-extend-override-date

     Whether using ‘magit-commit-extend’ changes the committer date.

 -- User Option: magit-commit-reword-override-date

     Whether using ‘magit-commit-reword’ changes the committer date.

 -- User Option: magit-commit-squash-confirm

     Whether the commit targeted by squash and fixup has to be
     confirmed.  When non-nil then the commit at point (if any) is used
     as default choice.  Otherwise it has to be confirmed.  This option
     only affects ‘magit-commit-squash’ and ‘magit-commit-fixup’.  The
     "instant" variants always require confirmation because making an
     error while using those is harder to recover from.


File: magit.info,  Node: Editing Commit Messages,  Prev: Initiating a Commit,  Up: Committing

6.5.2 Editing Commit Messages
-----------------------------

After initiating a commit as described in the previous section, two new
buffers appear.  One shows the changes that are about to be committed,
while the other is used to write the message.

   Commit messages are edited in an edit session - in the background
‘git’ is waiting for the editor, in our case ‘emacsclient’, to save the
commit message in a file (in most cases ‘.git/COMMIT_EDITMSG’) and then
return.  If the editor returns with a non-zero exit status then ‘git’
does not create the commit.  So the most important commands are those
for finishing and aborting the commit.

‘C-c C-c’     (‘with-editor-finish’)

     Finish the current editing session by returning with exit code 0.
     Git then creates the commit using the message it finds in the file.

‘C-c C-k’     (‘with-editor-cancel’)

     Cancel the current editing session by returning with exit code 1.
     Git then cancels the commit, but leaves the file untouched.

   In addition to being used by ‘git commit’, messages may also be
stored in a ring that persists until Emacs is closed.  By default the
message is stored at the beginning and the end of an edit session
(regardless of whether the session is finished successfully or was
canceled).  It is sometimes useful to bring back messages from that
ring.

‘C-c M-s’     (‘git-commit-save-message’)

     Save the current buffer content to the commit message ring.

‘M-p’     (‘git-commit-prev-message’)

     Cycle backward through the commit message ring, after saving the
     current message to the ring.  With a numeric prefix ARG, go back
     ARG comments.

‘M-n’     (‘git-commit-next-message’)

     Cycle forward through the commit message ring, after saving the
     current message to the ring.  With a numeric prefix ARG, go back
     ARG comments.

   By default the diff for the changes that are about to be committed
are automatically shown when invoking the commit.  To prevent that,
remove ‘magit-commit-diff’ from ‘server-switch-hook’.

   When amending to an existing commit it may be useful to show either
the changes that are about to be added to that commit or to show those
changes alongside those that have already been committed.

‘C-c C-d’     (‘magit-diff-while-committing’)

     While committing, show the changes that are about to be committed.
     While amending, invoking the command again toggles between showing
     just the new changes or all the changes that will be committed.

* Menu:

* Using the Revision Stack::
* Commit Pseudo Headers::
* Commit Mode and Hooks::
* Commit Message Conventions::


File: magit.info,  Node: Using the Revision Stack,  Next: Commit Pseudo Headers,  Up: Editing Commit Messages

Using the Revision Stack
........................

‘C-c C-w’     (‘magit-pop-revision-stack’)

     This command inserts a representation of a revision into the
     current buffer.  It can be used inside buffers used to write commit
     messages but also in other buffers such as buffers used to edit
     emails or ChangeLog files.

     By default this command pops the revision which was last added to
     the ‘magit-revision-stack’ and inserts it into the current buffer
     according to ‘magit-pop-revision-stack-format’.  Revisions can be
     put on the stack using ‘magit-copy-section-value’ and
     ‘magit-copy-buffer-revision’.

     If the stack is empty or with a prefix argument it instead reads a
     revision in the minibuffer.  By using the minibuffer history this
     allows selecting an item which was popped earlier or to insert an
     arbitrary reference or revision without first pushing it onto the
     stack.

     When reading the revision from the minibuffer, then it might not be
     possible to guess the correct repository.  When this command is
     called inside a repository (e.g.  while composing a commit
     message), then that repository is used.  Otherwise (e.g.  while
     composing an email) then the repository recorded for the top
     element of the stack is used (even though we insert another
     revision).  If not called inside a repository and with an empty
     stack, or with two prefix arguments, then read the repository in
     the minibuffer too.

 -- User Option: magit-pop-revision-stack-format

     This option controls how the command ‘magit-pop-revision-stack’
     inserts a revision into the current buffer.

     The entries on the stack have the format ‘(HASH TOPLEVEL)’ and this
     option has the format ‘(POINT-FORMAT EOB-FORMAT INDEX-REGEXP)’, all
     of which may be nil or a string (though either one of EOB-FORMAT or
     POINT-FORMAT should be a string, and if INDEX-REGEXP is non-nil,
     then the two formats should be too).

     First INDEX-REGEXP is used to find the previously inserted entry,
     by searching backward from point.  The first submatch must match
     the index number.  That number is incremented by one, and becomes
     the index number of the entry to be inserted.  If you don’t want to
     number the inserted revisions, then use nil for INDEX-REGEXP.

     If INDEX-REGEXP is non-nil then both POINT-FORMAT and EOB-FORMAT
     should contain \"%N\", which is replaced with the number that was
     determined in the previous step.

     Both formats, if non-nil and after removing %N, are then expanded
     using ‘git show --format=FORMAT ...’ inside TOPLEVEL.

     The expansion of POINT-FORMAT is inserted at point, and the
     expansion of EOB-FORMAT is inserted at the end of the buffer (if
     the buffer ends with a comment, then it is inserted right before
     that).


File: magit.info,  Node: Commit Pseudo Headers,  Next: Commit Mode and Hooks,  Prev: Using the Revision Stack,  Up: Editing Commit Messages

Commit Pseudo Headers
.....................

Some projects use pseudo headers in commit messages.  Magit colorizes
such headers and provides some commands to insert such headers.

 -- User Option: git-commit-known-pseudo-headers

     A list of Git pseudo headers to be highlighted.

‘C-c C-i’     (‘git-commit-insert-pseudo-header’)

     Insert a commit message pseudo header.

‘C-c C-a’     (‘git-commit-ack’)

     Insert a header acknowledging that you have looked at the commit.

‘C-c C-r’     (‘git-commit-review’)

     Insert a header acknowledging that you have reviewed the commit.

‘C-c C-s’     (‘git-commit-signoff’)

     Insert a header to sign off the commit.

‘C-c C-t’     (‘git-commit-test’)

     Insert a header acknowledging that you have tested the commit.

‘C-c C-o’     (‘git-commit-cc’)

     Insert a header mentioning someone who might be interested.

‘C-c C-p’     (‘git-commit-reported’)

     Insert a header mentioning the person who reported the issue being
     fixed by the commit.

‘C-c M-i’     (‘git-commit-suggested’)

     Insert a header mentioning the person who suggested the change.


File: magit.info,  Node: Commit Mode and Hooks,  Next: Commit Message Conventions,  Prev: Commit Pseudo Headers,  Up: Editing Commit Messages

Commit Mode and Hooks
.....................

‘git-commit-mode’ is a minor mode that is only used to establish certain
key bindings.  This makes it possible to use an arbitrary major mode in
buffers used to edit commit messages.  It is even possible to use
different major modes in different repositories, which is useful when
different projects impose different commit message conventions.

 -- User Option: git-commit-major-mode

     The value of this option is the major mode used to edit Git commit
     messages.

   Because ‘git-commit-mode’ is a minor mode, we don’t use its mode hook
to setup the buffer, except for the key bindings.  All other setup
happens in the function ‘git-commit-setup’, which among other things
runs the hook ‘git-commit-setup-hook’.

 -- User Option: git-commit-setup-hook

     Hook run at the end of ‘git-commit-setup’.

The following functions are suitable for this hook:

 -- Function: git-commit-save-message

     Save the current buffer content to the commit message ring.

 -- Function: git-commit-setup-changelog-support

     After this function is called, ChangeLog entries are treated as
     paragraphs.

 -- Function: git-commit-turn-on-auto-fill

     Turn on ‘auto-fill-mode’ and set ‘fill-column’ to the value of
     ‘git-commit-fill-column’.

 -- Function: git-commit-turn-on-flyspell

     Turn on Flyspell mode.  Also prevent comments from being checked
     and finally check current non-comment text.

 -- Function: git-commit-propertize-diff

     Propertize the diff shown inside the commit message buffer.  Git
     inserts such diffs into the commit message template when the
     ‘--verbose’ argument is used.  ‘magit-commit’ by default does not
     offer that argument because the diff that is shown in a separate
     buffer is more useful.  But some users disagree, which is why this
     function exists.

 -- Function: bug-reference-mode

     Hyperlink bug references in the buffer.

 -- Function: with-editor-usage-message

     Show usage information in the echo area.

 -- User Option: git-commit-setup-hook

     Hook run after the user finished writing a commit message.

     This hook is only run after pressing ‘C-c C-c’ in a buffer used to
     edit a commit message.  If a commit is created without the user
     typing a message into a buffer, then this hook is not run.

     This hook is not run until the new commit has been created.  If
     doing so takes Git longer than one second, then this hook isn’t run
     at all.  For certain commands such as ‘magit-rebase-continue’ this
     hook is never run because doing so would lead to a race condition.

     This hook is only run if ‘magit’ is available.

     Also see ‘magit-post-commit-hook’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Commit Message Conventions,  Prev: Commit Mode and Hooks,  Up: Editing Commit Messages

Commit Message Conventions
..........................

Git-Commit highlights certain violations of commonly accepted commit
message conventions.  Certain violations even cause Git-Commit to ask
you to confirm that you really want to do that.  This nagging can of
course be turned off, but the result of doing that usually is that
instead of some code it’s now the human who is reviewing your commits
who has to waste some time telling you to fix your commits.

 -- User Option: git-commit-summary-max-length

     The intended maximal length of the summary line of commit messages.
     Characters beyond this column are colorized to indicate that this
     preference has been violated.

 -- User Option: git-commit-fill-column

     Column beyond which automatic line-wrapping should happen in commit
     message buffers.

 -- User Option: git-commit-finish-query-functions

     List of functions called to query before performing commit.

     The commit message buffer is current while the functions are
     called.  If any of them returns nil, then the commit is not
     performed and the buffer is not killed.  The user should then fix
     the issue and try again.

     The functions are called with one argument.  If it is non-nil then
     that indicates that the user used a prefix argument to force
     finishing the session despite issues.  Functions should usually
     honor this wish and return non-nil.

     By default the only member is ‘git-commit-check-style-conventions’.

 -- Function: git-commit-check-style-conventions

     This function checks for violations of certain basic style
     conventions.  For each violation it asks users if they want to
     proceed anyway.

 -- User Option: git-commit-style-convention-checks

     This option controls what conventions the function by the same name
     tries to enforce.  The value is a list of self-explanatory symbols
     identifying certain conventions; ‘non-empty-second-line’ and
     ‘overlong-summary-line’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Branching,  Next: Merging,  Prev: Committing,  Up: Manipulating

6.6 Branching
=============

* Menu:

* The Two Remotes::
* Branch Commands::
* Branch Git Variables::
* Auxiliary Branch Commands::


File: magit.info,  Node: The Two Remotes,  Next: Branch Commands,  Up: Branching

6.6.1 The Two Remotes
---------------------

The upstream branch of some local branch is the branch into which the
commits on that local branch should eventually be merged, usually
something like ‘origin/master’.  For the ‘master’ branch itself the
upstream branch and the branch it is being pushed to, are usually the
same remote branch.  But for a feature branch the upstream branch and
the branch it is being pushed to should differ.

   The commits on feature branches too should _eventually_ end up in a
remote branch such as ‘origin/master’ or ‘origin/maint’.  Such a branch
should therefore be used as the upstream.  But feature branches
shouldn’t be pushed directly to such branches.  Instead a feature branch
‘my-feature’ is usually pushed to ‘my-fork/my-feature’ or if you are a
contributor ‘origin/my-feature’.  After the new feature has been
reviewed, the maintainer merges the feature into ‘master’.  And finally
‘master’ (not ‘my-feature’ itself) is pushed to ‘origin/master’.

   But new features seldom are perfect on the first try, and so feature
branches usually have to be reviewed, improved, and re-pushed several
times.  Pushing should therefore be easy to do, and for that reason many
Git users have concluded that it is best to use the remote branch to
which the local feature branch is being pushed as its upstream.

   But luckily Git has long ago gained support for a push-remote which
can be configured separately from the upstream branch, using the
variables ‘branch.<name>.pushRemote’ and ‘remote.pushDefault’.  So we no
longer have to choose which of the two remotes should be used as "the
remote".

   Each of the fetching, pulling, and pushing transient commands
features three suffix commands that act on the current branch and some
other branch.  Of these, ‘p’ is bound to a command which acts on the
push-remote, ‘u’ is bound to a command which acts on the upstream, and
‘e’ is bound to a command which acts on any other branch.  The status
buffer shows unpushed and unpulled commits for both the push-remote and
the upstream.

   It’s fairly simple to configure these two remotes.  The values of all
the variables that are related to fetching, pulling, and pushing (as
well as some other branch-related variables) can be inspected and
changed using the command ‘magit-branch-configure’, which is available
from many transient prefix commands that deal with branches.  It is also
possible to set the push-remote or upstream while pushing (see *note
Pushing::).


File: magit.info,  Node: Branch Commands,  Next: Branch Git Variables,  Prev: The Two Remotes,  Up: Branching

6.6.2 Branch Commands
---------------------

The transient prefix command ‘magit-branch’ is used to create and
checkout branches, and to make changes to existing branches.  It is not
used to fetch, pull, merge, rebase, or push branches, i.e.  this command
deals with branches themselves, not with the commits reachable from
them.  Those features are available from separate transient command.

‘b’     (‘magit-branch’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

     By default it also binds and displays the values of some
     branch-related Git variables and allows changing their values.

 -- User Option: magit-branch-direct-configure

     This option controls whether the transient command ‘magit-branch’
     can be used directly change the values Git variables.  This
     defaults to ‘t’ (to avoid changing key bindings).  When set to
     ‘nil’, then no variables are displayed by that transient command,
     and its suffix command ‘magit-branch-configure’ has to be used
     instead to view and change branch related variables.

‘b C’     (‘magit-branch-configure’)
‘f C’     (‘magit-branch-configure’)
‘F C’     (‘magit-branch-configure’)
‘P C’     (‘magit-branch-configure’)

     This transient prefix command binds commands that set the value of
     branch-related variables and displays them in a temporary buffer
     until the transient is exited.

     With a prefix argument, this command always prompts for a branch.

     Without a prefix argument this depends on whether it was invoked as
     a suffix of ‘magit-branch’ and on the
     ‘magit-branch-direct-configure’ option.  If ‘magit-branch’ already
     displays the variables for the current branch, then it isn’t useful
     to invoke another transient that displays them for the same branch.
     In that case this command prompts for a branch.

   The variables are described in *note Branch Git Variables::.

‘b b’     (‘magit-checkout’)

     Checkout a revision read in the minibuffer and defaulting to the
     branch or arbitrary revision at point.  If the revision is a local
     branch then that becomes the current branch.  If it is something
     else then ‘HEAD’ becomes detached.  Checkout fails if the working
     tree or the staging area contain changes.

‘b n’     (‘magit-branch-create’)

     Create a new branch.  The user is asked for a branch or arbitrary
     revision to use as the starting point of the new branch.  When a
     branch name is provided, then that becomes the upstream branch of
     the new branch.  The name of the new branch is also read in the
     minibuffer.

     Also see option ‘magit-branch-prefer-remote-upstream’.

‘b c’     (‘magit-branch-and-checkout’)

     This command creates a new branch like ‘magit-branch’, but then
     also checks it out.

     Also see option ‘magit-branch-prefer-remote-upstream’.

‘b l’     (‘magit-branch-checkout’)

     This command checks out an existing or new local branch.  It reads
     a branch name from the user offering all local branches and a
     subset of remote branches as candidates.  Remote branches for which
     a local branch by the same name exists are omitted from the list of
     candidates.  The user can also enter a completely new branch name.

        • If the user selects an existing local branch, then that is
          checked out.

        • If the user selects a remote branch, then it creates and
          checks out a new local branch with the same name, and
          configures the selected remote branch as the push target.

        • If the user enters a new branch name, then it creates and
          checks that out, after also reading the starting-point from
          the user.

     In the latter two cases the upstream is also set.  Whether it is
     set to the chosen starting point or something else depends on the
     value of ‘magit-branch-adjust-remote-upstream-alist’.

‘b s’     (‘magit-branch-spinoff’)

     This command creates and checks out a new branch starting at and
     tracking the current branch.  That branch in turn is reset to the
     last commit it shares with its upstream.  If the current branch has
     no upstream or no unpushed commits, then the new branch is created
     anyway and the previously current branch is not touched.

     This is useful to create a feature branch after work has already
     began on the old branch (likely but not necessarily "master").

     If the current branch is a member of the value of option
     ‘magit-branch-prefer-remote-upstream’ (which see), then the current
     branch will be used as the starting point as usual, but the
     upstream of the starting-point may be used as the upstream of the
     new branch, instead of the starting-point itself.

     If optional FROM is non-nil, then the source branch is reset to
     ‘FROM~’, instead of to the last commit it shares with its upstream.
     Interactively, FROM is only ever non-nil, if the region selects
     some commits, and among those commits, FROM is the commit that is
     the fewest commits ahead of the source branch.

     The commit at the other end of the selection actually does not
     matter, all commits between FROM and ‘HEAD’ are moved to the new
     branch.  If FROM is not reachable from ‘HEAD’ or is reachable from
     the source branch’s upstream, then an error is raised.

‘b S’     (‘magit-branch-spinout’)

     This command behaves like ‘magit-branch-spinoff’, except that it
     does not change the current branch.  If there are any uncommitted
     changes, then it behaves exactly like ‘magit-branch-spinoff’.

‘b x’     (‘magit-branch-reset’)

     This command resets a branch, defaulting to the branch at point, to
     the tip of another branch or any other commit.

     When the branch being reset is the current branch, then a hard
     reset is performed.  If there are any uncommitted changes, then the
     user has to confirm the reset because those changes would be lost.

     This is useful when you have started work on a feature branch but
     realize it’s all crap and want to start over.

     When resetting to another branch and a prefix argument is used,
     then the target branch is set as the upstream of the branch that is
     being reset.

‘b k’     (‘magit-branch-delete’)

     Delete one or multiple branches.  If the region marks multiple
     branches, then offer to delete those.  Otherwise, prompt for a
     single branch to be deleted, defaulting to the branch at point.

‘b r’     (‘magit-branch-rename’)

     Rename a branch.  The branch and the new name are read in the
     minibuffer.  With prefix argument the branch is renamed even if
     that name conflicts with an existing branch.

 -- User Option: magit-branch-read-upstream-first

     When creating a branch, whether to read the upstream branch before
     the name of the branch that is to be created.  The default is ‘t’,
     and I recommend you leave it at that.

 -- User Option: magit-branch-prefer-remote-upstream

     This option specifies whether remote upstreams are favored over
     local upstreams when creating new branches.

     When a new branch is created, then the branch, commit, or stash at
     point is suggested as the starting point of the new branch, or if
     there is no such revision at point the current branch.  In either
     case the user may choose another starting point.

     If the chosen starting point is a branch, then it may also be set
     as the upstream of the new branch, depending on the value of the
     Git variable ‘branch.autoSetupMerge’.  By default this is done for
     remote branches, but not for local branches.

     You might prefer to always use some remote branch as upstream.  If
     the chosen starting point is (1) a local branch, (2) whose name
     matches a member of the value of this option, (3) the upstream of
     that local branch is a remote branch with the same name, and (4)
     that remote branch can be fast-forwarded to the local branch, then
     the chosen branch is used as starting point, but its own upstream
     is used as the upstream of the new branch.

     Members of this option’s value are treated as branch names that
     have to match exactly unless they contain a character that makes
     them invalid as a branch name.  Recommended characters to use to
     trigger interpretation as a regexp are "*" and "^".  Some other
     characters which you might expect to be invalid, actually are not,
     e.g.  ".+$" are all perfectly valid.  More precisely, if ‘git
     check-ref-format --branch STRING’ exits with a non-zero status,
     then treat STRING as a regexp.

     Assuming the chosen branch matches these conditions you would end
     up with with e.g.:

          feature --upstream--> origin/master

     instead of

          feature --upstream--> master --upstream--> origin/master

     Which you prefer is a matter of personal preference.  If you do
     prefer the former, then you should add branches such as ‘master’,
     ‘next’, and ‘maint’ to the value of this options.

 -- User Option: magit-branch-adjust-remote-upstream-alist

     The value of this option is an alist of branches to be used as the
     upstream when branching a remote branch.

     When creating a local branch from an ephemeral branch located on a
     remote, e.g.  a feature or hotfix branch, then that remote branch
     should usually not be used as the upstream branch, since the
     push-remote already allows accessing it and having both the
     upstream and the push-remote reference the same related branch
     would be wasteful.  Instead a branch like "maint" or "master"
     should be used as the upstream.

     This option allows specifying the branch that should be used as the
     upstream when branching certain remote branches.  The value is an
     alist of the form ‘((UPSTREAM . RULE)...)’.  The first matching
     element is used, the following elements are ignored.

     UPSTREAM is the branch to be used as the upstream for branches
     specified by RULE.  It can be a local or a remote branch.

     RULE can either be a regular expression, matching branches whose
     upstream should be the one specified by UPSTREAM.  Or it can be a
     list of the only branches that should *not* use UPSTREAM; all other
     branches will.  Matching is done after stripping the remote part of
     the name of the branch that is being branched from.

     If you use a finite set of non-ephemeral branches across all your
     repositories, then you might use something like:

          (("origin/master" "master" "next" "maint"))

     Or if the names of all your ephemeral branches contain a slash, at
     least in some repositories, then a good value could be:

          (("origin/master" . "/"))

     Of course you can also fine-tune:

          (("origin/maint" . "\\`hotfix/")
           ("origin/master" . "\\`feature/"))

 -- Command: magit-branch-orphan

     This command creates and checks out a new orphan branch with
     contents from a given revision.

 -- Command: magit-branch-or-checkout

     This command is a hybrid between ‘magit-checkout’ and
     ‘magit-branch-and-checkout’ and is intended as a replacement for
     the former in ‘magit-branch’.

     It first asks the user for an existing branch or revision.  If the
     user input actually can be resolved as a branch or revision, then
     it checks that out, just like ‘magit-checkout’ would.

     Otherwise it creates and checks out a new branch using the input as
     its name.  Before doing so it reads the starting-point for the new
     branch.  This is similar to what ‘magit-branch-and-checkout’ does.

     To use this command instead of ‘magit-checkout’ add this to your
     init file:

          (transient-replace-suffix 'magit-branch 'magit-checkout
            '("b" "dwim" magit-branch-or-checkout))


File: magit.info,  Node: Branch Git Variables,  Next: Auxiliary Branch Commands,  Prev: Branch Commands,  Up: Branching

6.6.3 Branch Git Variables
--------------------------

These variables can be set from the transient prefix command
‘magit-branch-configure’.  By default they can also be set from
‘magit-branch’.  See *note Branch Commands::.

 -- Variable: branch.NAME.merge

     Together with ‘branch.NAME.remote’ this variable defines the
     upstream branch of the local branch named NAME.  The value of this
     variable is the full reference of the upstream _branch_.

 -- Variable: branch.NAME.remote

     Together with ‘branch.NAME.merge’ this variable defines the
     upstream branch of the local branch named NAME.  The value of this
     variable is the name of the upstream _remote_.

 -- Variable: branch.NAME.rebase

     This variable controls whether pulling into the branch named NAME
     is done by rebasing or by merging the fetched branch.

        • When ‘true’ then pulling is done by rebasing.

        • When ‘false’ then pulling is done by merging.

        • When undefined then the value of ‘pull.rebase’ is used.  The
          default of that variable is ‘false’.

 -- Variable: branch.NAME.pushRemote

     This variable specifies the remote that the branch named NAME is
     usually pushed to.  The value has to be the name of an existing
     remote.

     It is not possible to specify the name of _branch_ to push the
     local branch to.  The name of the remote branch is always the same
     as the name of the local branch.

     If this variable is undefined but ‘remote.pushDefault’ is defined,
     then the value of the latter is used.  By default
     ‘remote.pushDefault’ is undefined.

 -- Variable: branch.NAME.description

     This variable can be used to describe the branch named NAME.  That
     description is used e.g.  when turning the branch into a series of
     patches.

   The following variables specify defaults which are used if the above
branch-specific variables are not set.

 -- Variable: pull.rebase

     This variable specifies whether pulling is done by rebasing or by
     merging.  It can be overwritten using ‘branch.NAME.rebase’.

        • When ‘true’ then pulling is done by rebasing.

        • When ‘false’ (the default) then pulling is done by merging.

     Since it is never a good idea to merge the upstream branch into a
     feature or hotfix branch and most branches are such branches, you
     should consider setting this to ‘true’, and ‘branch.master.rebase’
     to ‘false’.

 -- Variable: remote.pushDefault

     This variable specifies what remote the local branches are usually
     pushed to.  This can be overwritten per branch using
     ‘branch.NAME.pushRemote’.

   The following variables are used during the creation of a branch and
control whether the various branch-specific variables are automatically
set at this time.

 -- Variable: branch.autoSetupMerge

     This variable specifies under what circumstances creating a branch
     NAME should result in the variables ‘branch.NAME.merge’ and
     ‘branch.NAME.remote’ being set according to the starting point used
     to create the branch.  If the starting point isn’t a branch, then
     these variables are never set.

        • When ‘always’ then the variables are set regardless of whether
          the starting point is a local or a remote branch.

        • When ‘true’ (the default) then the variables are set when the
          starting point is a remote branch, but not when it is a local
          branch.

        • When ‘false’ then the variables are never set.

 -- Variable: branch.autoSetupRebase

     This variable specifies whether creating a branch NAME should
     result in the variable ‘branch.NAME.rebase’ being set to ‘true’.

        • When ‘always’ then the variable is set regardless of whether
          the starting point is a local or a remote branch.

        • When ‘local’ then the variable are set when the starting point
          is a local branch, but not when it is a remote branch.

        • When ‘remote’ then the variable are set when the starting
          point is a remote branch, but not when it is a local branch.

        • When ‘never’ (the default) then the variable is never set.

   Note that the respective commands always change the repository-local
values.  If you want to change the global value, which is used when the
local value is undefined, then you have to do so on the command line,
e.g.:

     git config --global remote.autoSetupMerge always

   For more information about these variables you should also see

   *note (gitman)git-config::.  Also see *note (gitman)git-branch::.  ,
*note (gitman)git-checkout::.  and *note Pushing::.

 -- User Option: magit-prefer-remote-upstream

     This option controls whether commands that read a branch from the
     user and then set it as the upstream branch, offer a local or a
     remote branch as default completion candidate, when they have the
     choice.

     This affects all commands that use ‘magit-read-upstream-branch’ or
     ‘magit-read-starting-point’, which includes all commands that
     change the upstream and many which create new branches.


File: magit.info,  Node: Auxiliary Branch Commands,  Prev: Branch Git Variables,  Up: Branching

6.6.4 Auxiliary Branch Commands
-------------------------------

These commands are not available from the transient ‘magit-branch’ by
default.

 -- Command: magit-branch-shelve

     This command shelves a branch.  This is done by deleting the
     branch, and creating a new reference "refs/shelved/BRANCH-NAME"
     pointing at the same commit as the branch pointed at.  If the
     deleted branch had a reflog, then that is preserved as the reflog
     of the new reference.

     This is useful if you want to move a branch out of sight, but are
     not ready to completely discard it yet.

 -- Command: magit-branch-unshelve

     This command unshelves a branch that was previously shelved using
     ‘magit-branch-shelve’.  This is done by deleting the reference
     "refs/shelved/BRANCH-NAME" and creating a branch "BRANCH-NAME"
     pointing at the same commit as the deleted reference pointed at.
     If the deleted reference had a reflog, then that is restored as the
     reflog of the branch.


File: magit.info,  Node: Merging,  Next: Resolving Conflicts,  Prev: Branching,  Up: Manipulating

6.7 Merging
===========

Also see *note (gitman)git-merge::.  For information on how to resolve
merge conflicts see the next section.

‘m’     (‘magit-merge’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   When no merge is in progress, then the transient features the
following suffix commands.

‘m m’     (‘magit-merge-plain’)

     This command merges another branch or an arbitrary revision into
     the current branch.  The branch or revision to be merged is read in
     the minibuffer and defaults to the branch at point.

     Unless there are conflicts or a prefix argument is used, then the
     resulting merge commit uses a generic commit message, and the user
     does not get a chance to inspect or change it before the commit is
     created.  With a prefix argument this does not actually create the
     merge commit, which makes it possible to inspect how conflicts were
     resolved and to adjust the commit message.

‘m e’     (‘magit-merge-editmsg’)

     This command merges another branch or an arbitrary revision into
     the current branch and opens a commit message buffer, so that the
     user can make adjustments.  The commit is not actually created
     until the user finishes with ‘C-c C-c’.

‘m n’     (‘magit-merge-nocommit’)

     This command merges another branch or an arbitrary revision into
     the current branch, but does not actually create the merge commit.
     The user can then further adjust the merge, even when automatic
     conflict resolution succeeded and/or adjust the commit message.

‘m a’     (‘magit-merge-absorb’)

     This command merges another local branch into the current branch
     and then removes the former.

     Before the source branch is merged, it is first force pushed to its
     push-remote, provided the respective remote branch already exists.
     This ensures that the respective pull-request (if any) won’t get
     stuck on some obsolete version of the commits that are being
     merged.  Finally, if ‘magit-branch-pull-request’ was used to create
     the merged branch, then the respective remote branch is also
     removed.

‘m i’     (‘magit-merge-into’)

     This command merges the current branch into another local branch
     and then removes the former.  The latter becomes the new current
     branch.

     Before the source branch is merged, it is first force pushed to its
     push-remote, provided the respective remote branch already exists.
     This ensures that the respective pull-request (if any) won’t get
     stuck on some obsolete version of the commits that are being
     merged.  Finally, if ‘magit-branch-pull-request’ was used to create
     the merged branch, then the respective remote branch is also
     removed.

‘m s’     (‘magit-merge-squash’)

     This command squashes the changes introduced by another branch or
     an arbitrary revision into the current branch.  This only applies
     the changes made by the squashed commits.  No information is
     preserved that would allow creating an actual merge commit.
     Instead of this command you should probably use a command from the
     apply transient.

‘m p’     (‘magit-merge-preview’)

     This command shows a preview of merging another branch or an
     arbitrary revision into the current branch.

   When a merge is in progress, then the transient instead features the
following suffix commands.

‘m m’     (‘magit-merge’)

     After the user resolved conflicts, this command proceeds with the
     merge.  If some conflicts weren’t resolved, then this command
     fails.

‘m a’     (‘magit-merge-abort’)

     This command aborts the current merge operation.


File: magit.info,  Node: Resolving Conflicts,  Next: Rebasing,  Prev: Merging,  Up: Manipulating

6.8 Resolving Conflicts
=======================

When merging branches (or otherwise combining or changing history)
conflicts can occur.  If you edited two completely different parts of
the same file in two branches and then merge one of these branches into
the other, then Git can resolve that on its own, but if you edit the
same area of a file, then a human is required to decide how the two
versions, or "sides of the conflict", are to be combined into one.

   Here we can only provide a brief introduction to the subject and
point you toward some tools that can help.  If you are new to this, then
please also consult Git’s own documentation as well as other resources.

   If a file has conflicts and Git cannot resolve them by itself, then
it puts both versions into the affected file along with special markers
whose purpose is to denote the boundaries of the unresolved part of the
file and between the different versions.  These boundary lines begin
with the strings consisting of six times the same character, one of ‘<’,
‘|’, ‘=’ and ‘>’ and are followed by information about the source of the
respective versions, e.g.:

     <<<<<<< HEAD
     Take the blue pill.
     =======
     Take the red pill.
     >>>>>>> feature

   In this case you have chosen to take the red pill on one branch and
on another you picked the blue pill.  Now that you are merging these two
diverging branches, Git cannot possibly know which pill you want to
take.

   To resolve that conflict you have to create a version of the affected
area of the file by keeping only one of the sides, possibly by editing
it in order to bring in the changes from the other side, remove the
other versions as well as the markers, and then stage the result.  A
possible resolution might be:

     Take both pills.

   Often it is useful to see not only the two sides of the conflict but
also the "original" version from before the same area of the file was
modified twice on different branches.  Instruct Git to insert that
version as well by running this command once:

     git config --global merge.conflictStyle diff3

   The above conflict might then have looked like this:

     <<<<<<< HEAD
     Take the blue pill.
     ||||||| merged common ancestors
     Take either the blue or the red pill, but not both.
     =======
     Take the red pill.
     >>>>>>> feature

   If that were the case, then the above conflict resolution would not
have been correct, which demonstrates why seeing the original version
alongside the conflicting versions can be useful.

   You can perform the conflict resolution completely by hand, but Emacs
also provides some packages that help in the process: Smerge, Ediff
(*note (ediff)Top::), and Emerge (*note (emacs)Emerge::).  Magit does
not provide its own tools for conflict resolution, but it does make
using Smerge and Ediff more convenient.  (Ediff supersedes Emerge, so
you probably don’t want to use the latter anyway.)

   In the Magit status buffer, files with unresolved conflicts are
listed in the "Unstaged changes" and/or "Staged changes" sections.  They
are prefixed with the word "unmerged", which in this context essentially
is a synonym for "unresolved".

   Pressing ‘RET’ while point is on such a file section shows a buffer
visiting that file, turns on ‘smerge-mode’ in that buffer, and places
point inside the first area with conflicts.  You should then resolve
that conflict using regular edit commands and/or Smerge commands.

   Unfortunately Smerge does not have a manual, but you can get a list
of commands and binding ‘C-c ^ C-h’ and press ‘RET’ while point is on a
command name to read its documentation.

   Normally you would edit one version and then tell Smerge to keep only
that version.  Use ‘C-c ^ m’ (‘smerge-keep-mine’) to keep the ‘HEAD’
version or ‘C-c ^ o’ (‘smerge-keep-other’) to keep the version that
follows "|||||||".  Then use ‘C-c ^ n’ to move to the next conflicting
area in the same file.  Once you are done resolving conflicts, return to
the Magit status buffer.  The file should now be shown as "modified", no
longer as "unmerged", because Smerge automatically stages the file when
you save the buffer after resolving the last conflict.

   Alternatively you could use Ediff, which uses separate buffers for
the different versions of the file.  To resolve conflicts in a file
using Ediff press ‘e’ while point is on such a file in the status
buffer.

   Ediff can be used for other purposes as well.  For more information
on how to enter Ediff from Magit, see *note Ediffing::.  Explaining how
to use Ediff is beyond the scope of this manual, instead see *note
(ediff)Top::.

   If you are unsure whether you should Smerge or Ediff, then use the
former.  It is much easier to understand and use, and except for truly
complex conflicts, the latter is usually overkill.


File: magit.info,  Node: Rebasing,  Next: Cherry Picking,  Prev: Resolving Conflicts,  Up: Manipulating

6.9 Rebasing
============

Also see *note (gitman)git-rebase::.  For information on how to resolve
conflicts that occur during rebases see the preceding section.

‘r’     (‘magit-rebase’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   When no rebase is in progress, then the transient features the
following suffix commands.

   Using one of these commands _starts_ a rebase sequence.  Git might
then stop somewhere along the way, either because you told it to do so,
or because applying a commit failed due to a conflict.  When that
happens, then the status buffer shows information about the rebase
sequence which is in progress in a section similar to a log section.
See *note Information About In-Progress Rebase::.

   For information about the upstream and the push-remote, see *note The
Two Remotes::.

‘r p’     (‘magit-rebase-onto-pushremote’)

     This command rebases the current branch onto its push-remote.

     With a prefix argument or when the push-remote is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     push-remote.

‘r u’     (‘magit-rebase-onto-upstream’)

     This command rebases the current branch onto its upstream branch.

     With a prefix argument or when the upstream is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     upstream.

‘r e’     (‘magit-rebase-branch’)

     This command rebases the current branch onto a branch read in the
     minibuffer.  All commits that are reachable from head but not from
     the selected branch TARGET are being rebased.

‘r s’     (‘magit-rebase-subset’)

     This command starts a non-interactive rebase sequence to transfer
     commits from START to ‘HEAD’ onto NEWBASE.  START has to be
     selected from a list of recent commits.

   By default Magit uses the ‘--autostash’ argument, which causes
uncommitted changes to be stored in a stash before the rebase begins.
These changes are restored after the rebase completes and if possible
the stash is removed.  If the stash does not apply cleanly, then the
stash is not removed.  In case something goes wrong when resolving the
conflicts, this allows you to start over.

   Even though one of the actions is dedicated to interactive rebases,
the transient also features the infix argument ‘--interactive’.  This
can be used to turn one of the other, non-interactive rebase variants
into an interactive rebase.

   For example if you want to clean up a feature branch and at the same
time rebase it onto ‘master’, then you could use ‘r-iu’.  But we
recommend that you instead do that in two steps.  First use ‘ri’ to
cleanup the feature branch, and then in a second step ‘ru’ to rebase it
onto ‘master’.  That way if things turn out to be more complicated than
you thought and/or you make a mistake and have to start over, then you
only have to redo half the work.

   Explicitly enabling ‘--interactive’ won’t have an effect on the
following commands as they always use that argument anyway, even if it
is not enabled in the transient.

‘r i’     (‘magit-rebase-interactive’)

     This command starts an interactive rebase sequence.

‘r f’     (‘magit-rebase-autosquash’)

     This command combines squash and fixup commits with their intended
     targets.

‘r m’     (‘magit-rebase-edit-commit’)

     This command starts an interactive rebase sequence that lets the
     user edit a single older commit.

‘r w’     (‘magit-rebase-reword-commit’)

     This command starts an interactive rebase sequence that lets the
     user reword a single older commit.

‘r k’     (‘magit-rebase-remove-commit’)

     This command removes a single older commit using rebase.

   When a rebase is in progress, then the transient instead features the
following suffix commands.

‘r r’     (‘magit-rebase-continue’)

     This command restart the current rebasing operation.

     In some cases this pops up a commit message buffer for you do edit.
     With a prefix argument the old message is reused as-is.

‘r s’     (‘magit-rebase-skip’)

     This command skips the current commit and restarts the current
     rebase operation.

‘r e’     (‘magit-rebase-edit’)

     This command lets the user edit the todo list of the current rebase
     operation.

‘r a’     (‘magit-rebase-abort’)

     This command aborts the current rebase operation, restoring the
     original branch.

* Menu:

* Editing Rebase Sequences::
* Information About In-Progress Rebase::


File: magit.info,  Node: Editing Rebase Sequences,  Next: Information About In-Progress Rebase,  Up: Rebasing

6.9.1 Editing Rebase Sequences
------------------------------

‘C-c C-c’     (‘with-editor-finish’)

     Finish the current editing session by returning with exit code 0.
     Git then uses the rebase instructions it finds in the file.

‘C-c C-k’     (‘with-editor-cancel’)

     Cancel the current editing session by returning with exit code 1.
     Git then forgoes starting the rebase sequence.

‘RET’     (‘git-rebase-show-commit’)

     Show the commit on the current line in another buffer and select
     that buffer.

‘SPC’     (‘git-rebase-show-or-scroll-up’)

     Show the commit on the current line in another buffer without
     selecting that buffer.  If the revision buffer is already visible
     in another window of the current frame, then instead scroll that
     window up.

‘DEL’     (‘git-rebase-show-or-scroll-down’)

     Show the commit on the current line in another buffer without
     selecting that buffer.  If the revision buffer is already visible
     in another window of the current frame, then instead scroll that
     window down.

‘p’     (‘git-rebase-backward-line’)

     Move to previous line.

‘n’     (‘forward-line’)

     Move to next line.

‘M-p’     (‘git-rebase-move-line-up’)

     Move the current commit (or command) up.

‘M-n’     (‘git-rebase-move-line-down’)

     Move the current commit (or command) down.

‘r’     (‘git-rebase-reword’)

     Edit message of commit on current line.

‘e’     (‘git-rebase-edit’)

     Stop at the commit on the current line.

‘s’     (‘git-rebase-squash’)

     Meld commit on current line into previous commit, and edit message.

‘f’     (‘git-rebase-fixup’)

     Meld commit on current line into previous commit, discarding the
     current commit’s message.

‘k’     (‘git-rebase-kill-line’)

     Kill the current action line.

‘c’     (‘git-rebase-pick’)

     Use commit on current line.

‘x’     (‘git-rebase-exec’)

     Insert a shell command to be run after the proceeding commit.

     If there already is such a command on the current line, then edit
     that instead.  With a prefix argument insert a new command even
     when there already is one on the current line.  With empty input
     remove the command on the current line, if any.

‘b’     (‘git-rebase-break’)

     Insert a break action before the current line, instructing Git to
     return control to the user.

‘y’     (‘git-rebase-insert’)

     Read an arbitrary commit and insert it below current line.

‘C-x u’     (‘git-rebase-undo’)

     Undo some previous changes.  Like ‘undo’ but works in read-only
     buffers.

 -- User Option: git-rebase-auto-advance

     Whether to move to next line after changing a line.

 -- User Option: git-rebase-show-instructions

     Whether to show usage instructions inside the rebase buffer.

 -- User Option: git-rebase-confirm-cancel

     Whether confirmation is required to cancel.

   When a rebase is performed with the ‘--rebase-merges’ option, the
sequence will include a few other types of actions and the following
commands become relevant.

‘l’     (‘git-rebase-label’)

     This commands inserts a label action or edits the one at point.

‘t’     (‘git-rebase-reset’)

     This command inserts a reset action or edits the one at point.  The
     prompt will offer the labels that are currently present in the
     buffer.

‘MM’     (‘git-rebase-merge’)

     The command inserts a merge action or edits the one at point.  The
     prompt will offer the labels that are currently present in the
     buffer.  Specifying a message to reuse via ‘-c’ or ‘-C’ is not
     supported; an editor will always be invoked for the merge.

‘Mt’     (‘git-rebase-merge-toggle-editmsg’)

     This command toggles between the ‘-C’ and ‘-c’ options of the merge
     action at point.  These options both specify a commit whose message
     should be reused.  The lower-case variant instructs Git to invoke
     the editor when creating the merge, allowing the user to edit the
     message.


File: magit.info,  Node: Information About In-Progress Rebase,  Prev: Editing Rebase Sequences,  Up: Rebasing

6.9.2 Information About In-Progress Rebase
------------------------------------------

While a rebase sequence is in progress, the status buffer features a
section that lists the commits that have already been applied as well as
the commits that still have to be applied.

   The commits are split in two halves.  When rebase stops at a commit,
either because the user has to deal with a conflict or because s/he
explicitly requested that rebase stops at that commit, then point is
placed on the commit that separates the two groups, i.e.  on ‘HEAD’.
The commits above it have not been applied yet, while the ‘HEAD’ and the
commits below it have already been applied.  In between these two groups
of applied and yet-to-be applied commits, there sometimes is a commit
which has been dropped.

   Each commit is prefixed with a word and these words are additionally
shown in different colors to indicate the status of the commits.

   The following colors are used:

   • Yellow commits have not been applied yet.

   • Gray commits have already been applied.

   • The blue commit is the ‘HEAD’ commit.

   • The green commit is the commit the rebase sequence stopped at.  If
     this is the same commit as ‘HEAD’ (e.g.  because you haven’t done
     anything yet after rebase stopped at the commit, then this commit
     is shown in blue, not green).  There can only be a green *and* a
     blue commit at the same time, if you create one or more new commits
     after rebase stops at a commit.

   • Red commits have been dropped.  They are shown for reference only,
     e.g.  to make it easier to diff.

   Of course these colors are subject to the color-theme in use.

   The following words are used:

   • Commits prefixed with ‘pick’, ‘reword’, ‘edit’, ‘squash’, and
     ‘fixup’ have not been applied yet.  These words have the same
     meaning here as they do in the buffer used to edit the rebase
     sequence.  See *note Editing Rebase Sequences::.  When the
     ‘--rebase-merges’ option was specified, ‘reset’, ‘label’, and
     ‘merge’ lines may also be present.

   • Commits prefixed with ‘done’ and ‘onto’ have already been applied.
     It is possible for such a commit to be the ‘HEAD’, in which case it
     is blue.  Otherwise it is grey.

        • The commit prefixed with ‘onto’ is the commit on top of which
          all the other commits are being re-applied.  This commit
          itself did not have to be re-applied, it is the commit rebase
          did rewind to before starting to re-apply other commits.

        • Commits prefixed with ‘done’ have already been re-applied.
          This includes commits that have been re-applied but also new
          commits that you have created during the rebase.

   • All other commits, those not prefixed with any of the above words,
     are in some way related to the commit at which rebase stopped.

     To determine whether a commit is related to the stopped-at commit
     their hashes, trees and patch-ids (1) are being compared.  The
     commit message is not used for this purpose.

     Generally speaking commits that are related to the stopped-at
     commit can have any of the used colors, though not all color/word
     combinations are possible.

     Words used for stopped-at commits are:

        • When a commit is prefixed with ‘void’, then that indicates
          that Magit knows for sure that all the changes in that commit
          have been applied using several new commits.  This commit is
          no longer reachable from ‘HEAD’, and it also isn’t one of the
          commits that will be applied when resuming the session.

        • When a commit is prefixed with ‘join’, then that indicates
          that the rebase sequence stopped at that commit due to a
          conflict - you now have to join (merge) the changes with what
          has already been applied.  In a sense this is the commit
          rebase stopped at, but while its effect is already in the
          index and in the worktree (with conflict markers), the commit
          itself has not actually been applied yet (it isn’t the
          ‘HEAD’).  So it is shown in yellow, like the other commits
          that still have to be applied.

        • When a commit is prefixed with ‘stop’ or a _blue_ or _green_
          ‘same’, then that indicates that rebase stopped at this
          commit, that it is still applied or has been applied again,
          and that at least its patch-id is unchanged.

             • When a commit is prefixed with ‘stop’, then that
               indicates that rebase stopped at that commit because you
               requested that earlier, and its patch-id is unchanged.
               It might even still be the exact same commit.

             • When a commit is prefixed with a _blue_ or _green_
               ‘same’, then that indicates that while its tree or hash
               changed, its patch-id did not.  If it is blue, then it is
               the ‘HEAD’ commit (as always for blue).  When it is
               green, then it no longer is ‘HEAD’ because other commit
               have been created since (but before continuing the
               rebase).

        • When a commit is prefixed with ‘goal’, a _yellow_ ‘same,’ or
          ‘work’, then that indicates that rebase applied that commit
          but that you then reset ‘HEAD’ to an earlier commit (likely to
          split it up into multiple commits), and that there are some
          uncommitted changes remaining which likely (but not
          necessarily) originate from that commit.

             • When a commit is prefixed with ‘goal’, then that
               indicates that it is still possible to create a new
               commit with the exact same tree (the "goal") without
               manually editing any files, by committing the index, or
               by staging all changes and then committing that.  This is
               the case when the original tree still exists in the index
               or worktree in untainted form.

             • When a commit is prefixed with a yellow ‘same’, then that
               indicates that it is no longer possible to create a
               commit with the exact same tree, but that it is still
               possible to create a commit with the same patch-id.  This
               would be the case if you created a new commit with other
               changes, but the changes from the original commit still
               exist in the index or working tree in untainted form.

             • When a commit is prefixed with ‘work’, then that
               indicates that you reset ‘HEAD’ to an earlier commit, and
               that there are some staged and/or unstaged changes
               (likely, but not necessarily) originating from that
               commit.  However it is no longer possible to create a new
               commit with the same tree or at least the same patch-id
               because you have already made other changes.

        • When a commit is prefixed with ‘poof’ or ‘gone’, then that
          indicates that rebase applied that commit but that you then
          reset ‘HEAD’ to an earlier commit (likely to split it up into
          multiple commits), and that there are no uncommitted changes.

             • When a commit is prefixed with ‘poof’, then that
               indicates that it is no longer reachable from ‘HEAD’, but
               that it has been replaced with one or more commits, which
               together have the exact same effect.

             • When a commit is prefixed with ‘gone’, then that
               indicates that it is no longer reachable from ‘HEAD’ and
               that we also cannot determine whether its changes are
               still in effect in one or more new commits.  They might
               be, but if so, then there must also be other changes
               which makes it impossible to know for sure.

   Do not worry if you do not fully understand the above.  That’s okay,
you will acquire a good enough understanding through practice.

   For other sequence operations such as cherry-picking, a similar
section is displayed, but they lack some of the features described
above, due to limitations in the git commands used to implement them.
Most importantly these sequences only support "picking" a commit but not
other actions such as "rewording", and they do not keep track of the
commits which have already been applied.

   ---------- Footnotes ----------

   (1) The patch-id is a hash of the _changes_ introduced by a commit.
It differs from the hash of the commit itself, which is a hash of the
result of applying that change (i.e.  the resulting trees and blobs) as
well as author and committer information, the commit message, and the
hashes of the parents of the commit.  The patch-id hash on the other
hand is created only from the added and removed lines, even line numbers
and whitespace changes are ignored when calculating this hash.  The
patch-ids of two commits can be used to answer the question "Do these
commits make the same change?".


File: magit.info,  Node: Cherry Picking,  Next: Resetting,  Prev: Rebasing,  Up: Manipulating

6.10 Cherry Picking
===================

Also see *note (gitman)git-cherry-pick::.

‘A’     (‘magit-cherry-pick’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   When no cherry-pick or revert is in progress, then the transient
features the following suffix commands.

‘A A’     (‘magit-cherry-copy’)

     This command copies COMMITS from another branch onto the current
     branch.  If the region selects multiple commits, then those are
     copied, without prompting.  Otherwise the user is prompted for a
     commit or range, defaulting to the commit at point.

‘A a’     (‘magit-cherry-apply’)

     This command applies the changes in COMMITS from another branch
     onto the current branch.  If the region selects multiple commits,
     then those are used, without prompting.  Otherwise the user is
     prompted for a commit or range, defaulting to the commit at point.

     This command also has a top-level binding, which can be invoked
     without using the transient by typing ‘a’ at the top-level.

   The following commands not only apply some commits to some branch,
but also remove them from some other branch.  The removal is performed
using either ‘git-update-ref’ or if necessary ‘git-rebase’.  Both
applying commits as well as removing them using ‘git-rebase’ can lead to
conflicts.  If that happens, then these commands abort and you not only
have to resolve the conflicts but also finish the process the same way
you would have to if these commands didn’t exist at all.

‘A h’     (‘magit-cherry-harvest’)

     This command moves the selected COMMITS that must be located on
     another BRANCH onto the current branch instead, removing them from
     the former.  When this command succeeds, then the same branch is
     current as before.

     Applying the commits on the current branch or removing them from
     the other branch can lead to conflicts.  When that happens, then
     this command stops and you have to resolve the conflicts and then
     finish the process manually.

‘A d’     (‘magit-cherry-donate’)

     This command moves the selected COMMITS from the current branch
     onto another existing BRANCH, removing them from the former.  When
     this command succeeds, then the same branch is current as before.

     Applying the commits on the other branch or removing them from the
     current branch can lead to conflicts.  When that happens, then this
     command stops and you have to resolve the conflicts and then finish
     the process manually.

‘A n’     (‘magit-cherry-spinout’)

     This command moves the selected COMMITS from the current branch
     onto a new branch BRANCH, removing them from the former.  When this
     command succeeds, then the same branch is current as before.

     Applying the commits on the other branch or removing them from the
     current branch can lead to conflicts.  When that happens, then this
     command stops and you have to resolve the conflicts and then finish
     the process manually.

‘A s’     (‘magit-cherry-spinoff’)

     This command moves the selected COMMITS from the current branch
     onto a new branch BRANCH, removing them from the former.  When this
     command succeeds, then the new branch is checked out.

     Applying the commits on the other branch or removing them from the
     current branch can lead to conflicts.  When that happens, then this
     command stops and you have to resolve the conflicts and then finish
     the process manually.

   When a cherry-pick or revert is in progress, then the transient
instead features the following suffix commands.

‘A A’     (‘magit-sequence-continue’)

     Resume the current cherry-pick or revert sequence.

‘A s’     (‘magit-sequence-skip’)

     Skip the stopped at commit during a cherry-pick or revert sequence.

‘A a’     (‘magit-sequence-abort’)

     Abort the current cherry-pick or revert sequence.  This discards
     all changes made since the sequence started.

* Menu:

* Reverting::


File: magit.info,  Node: Reverting,  Up: Cherry Picking

6.10.1 Reverting
----------------

‘V’     (‘magit-revert’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   When no cherry-pick or revert is in progress, then the transient
features the following suffix commands.

‘V V’     (‘magit-revert-and-commit’)

     Revert a commit by creating a new commit.  Prompt for a commit,
     defaulting to the commit at point.  If the region selects multiple
     commits, then revert all of them, without prompting.

‘V v’     (‘magit-revert-no-commit’)

     Revert a commit by applying it in reverse to the working tree.
     Prompt for a commit, defaulting to the commit at point.  If the
     region selects multiple commits, then revert all of them, without
     prompting.

   When a cherry-pick or revert is in progress, then the transient
instead features the following suffix commands.

‘V A’     (‘magit-sequence-continue’)

     Resume the current cherry-pick or revert sequence.

‘V s’     (‘magit-sequence-skip’)

     Skip the stopped at commit during a cherry-pick or revert sequence.

‘V a’     (‘magit-sequence-abort’)

     Abort the current cherry-pick or revert sequence.  This discards
     all changes made since the sequence started.


File: magit.info,  Node: Resetting,  Next: Stashing,  Prev: Cherry Picking,  Up: Manipulating

6.11 Resetting
==============

Also see *note (gitman)git-reset::.

‘x’     (‘magit-reset-quickly’)

     Reset the ‘HEAD’ and index to some commit read from the user and
     defaulting to the commit at point, and possibly also reset the
     working tree.  With a prefix argument reset the working tree
     otherwise don’t.

‘X m’     (‘magit-reset-mixed’)

     Reset the ‘HEAD’ and index to some commit read from the user and
     defaulting to the commit at point.  The working tree is kept as-is.

‘X s’     (‘magit-reset-soft’)

     Reset the ‘HEAD’ to some commit read from the user and defaulting
     to the commit at point.  The index and the working tree are kept
     as-is.

‘X h’     (‘magit-reset-hard’)

     Reset the ‘HEAD’, index, and working tree to some commit read from
     the user and defaulting to the commit at point.

‘X k’     (‘magit-reset-keep’)

     Reset the ‘HEAD’, index, and working tree to some commit read from
     the user and defaulting to the commit at point.  Uncommitted
     changes are kept as-is.

‘X i’     (‘magit-reset-index’)

     Reset the index to some commit read from the user and defaulting to
     the commit at point.  Keep the ‘HEAD’ and working tree as-is, so if
     the commit refers to the ‘HEAD’, then this effectively unstages all
     changes.

‘X w’     (‘magit-reset-worktree’)

     Reset the working tree to some commit read from the user and
     defaulting to the commit at point.  Keep the ‘HEAD’ and index
     as-is.

‘X f’     (‘magit-file-checkout’)

     Update file in the working tree and index to the contents from a
     revision.  Both the revision and file are read from the user.


File: magit.info,  Node: Stashing,  Prev: Resetting,  Up: Manipulating

6.12 Stashing
=============

Also see *note (gitman)git-stash::.

‘z’     (‘magit-stash’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘z z’     (‘magit-stash-both’)

     Create a stash of the index and working tree.  Untracked files are
     included according to infix arguments.  One prefix argument is
     equivalent to ‘--include-untracked’ while two prefix arguments are
     equivalent to ‘--all’.

‘z i’     (‘magit-stash-index’)

     Create a stash of the index only.  Unstaged and untracked changes
     are not stashed.

‘z w’     (‘magit-stash-worktree’)

     Create a stash of unstaged changes in the working tree.  Untracked
     files are included according to infix arguments.  One prefix
     argument is equivalent to ‘--include-untracked’ while two prefix
     arguments are equivalent to ‘--all’.

‘z x’     (‘magit-stash-keep-index’)

     Create a stash of the index and working tree, keeping index intact.
     Untracked files are included according to infix arguments.  One
     prefix argument is equivalent to ‘--include-untracked’ while two
     prefix arguments are equivalent to ‘--all’.

‘z Z’     (‘magit-snapshot-both’)

     Create a snapshot of the index and working tree.  Untracked files
     are included according to infix arguments.  One prefix argument is
     equivalent to ‘--include-untracked’ while two prefix arguments are
     equivalent to ‘--all’.

‘z I’     (‘magit-snapshot-index’)

     Create a snapshot of the index only.  Unstaged and untracked
     changes are not stashed.

‘z W’     (‘magit-snapshot-worktree’)

     Create a snapshot of unstaged changes in the working tree.
     Untracked files are included according to infix arguments.  One
     prefix argument is equivalent to ‘--include-untracked’ while two
     prefix arguments are equivalent to ‘--all’-.

‘z a’     (‘magit-stash-apply’)

     Apply a stash to the working tree.  Try to preserve the stash
     index.  If that fails because there are staged changes, apply
     without preserving the stash index.

‘z p’     (‘magit-stash-pop’)

     Apply a stash to the working tree and remove it from stash list.
     Try to preserve the stash index.  If that fails because there are
     staged changes, apply without preserving the stash index and forgo
     removing the stash.

‘z k’     (‘magit-stash-drop’)

     Remove a stash from the stash list.  When the region is active,
     offer to drop all contained stashes.

‘z v’     (‘magit-stash-show’)

     Show all diffs of a stash in a buffer.

‘z b’     (‘magit-stash-branch’)

     Create and checkout a new BRANCH from STASH.  The branch starts at
     the commit that was current when the stash was created.

‘z B’     (‘magit-stash-branch-here’)

     Create and checkout a new BRANCH using ‘magit-branch’ with the
     current branch or ‘HEAD’ as the starting-point.  Then apply STASH,
     dropping it if it applies cleanly.

‘z f’     (‘magit-stash-format-patch’)

     Create a patch from STASH.

‘k’     (‘magit-stash-clear’)

     Remove all stashes saved in REF’s reflog by deleting REF.

‘z l’     (‘magit-stash-list’)

     List all stashes in a buffer.

 -- User Option: magit-stashes-margin

     This option specifies whether the margin is initially shown in
     stashes buffers and how it is formatted.

     The value has the form ‘(INIT STYLE WIDTH AUTHOR AUTHOR-WIDTH)’.

        • If INIT is non-nil, then the margin is shown initially.

        • STYLE controls how to format the author or committer date.  It
          can be one of ‘age’ (to show the age of the commit),
          ‘age-abbreviated’ (to abbreviate the time unit to a
          character), or a string (suitable for ‘format-time-string’) to
          show the actual date.  Option
          ‘magit-log-margin-show-committer-date’ controls which date is
          being displayed.

        • WIDTH controls the width of the margin.  This exists for
          forward compatibility and currently the value should not be
          changed.

        • AUTHOR controls whether the name of the author is also shown
          by default.

        • AUTHOR-WIDTH has to be an integer.  When the name of the
          author is shown, then this specifies how much space is used to
          do so.


File: magit.info,  Node: Transferring,  Next: Miscellaneous,  Prev: Manipulating,  Up: Top

7 Transferring
**************

* Menu:

* Remotes::
* Fetching::
* Pulling::
* Pushing::
* Plain Patches::
* Maildir Patches::


File: magit.info,  Node: Remotes,  Next: Fetching,  Up: Transferring

7.1 Remotes
===========

* Menu:

* Remote Commands::
* Remote Git Variables::


File: magit.info,  Node: Remote Commands,  Next: Remote Git Variables,  Up: Remotes

7.1.1 Remote Commands
---------------------

The transient prefix command ‘magit-remote’ is used to add remotes and
to make changes to existing remotes.  This command only deals with
remotes themselves, not with branches or the transfer of commits.  Those
features are available from separate transient commands.

   Also see *note (gitman)git-remote::.

‘M’     (‘magit-remote’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

     By default it also binds and displays the values of some
     remote-related Git variables and allows changing their values.

 -- User Option: magit-remote-direct-configure

     This option controls whether remote-related Git variables are
     accessible directly from the transient ‘magit-remote’.

     If ‘t’ (the default) and a local branch is checked out, then
     ‘magit-remote’ features the variables for the upstream remote of
     that branch, or if ‘HEAD’ is detached, for ‘origin’, provided that
     exists.

     If ‘nil’, then ‘magit-remote-configure’ has to be used to do so.

‘M C’     (‘magit-remote-configure’)

     This transient prefix command binds commands that set the value of
     remote-related variables and displays them in a temporary buffer
     until the transient is exited.

     With a prefix argument, this command always prompts for a remote.

     Without a prefix argument this depends on whether it was invoked as
     a suffix of ‘magit-remote’ and on the
     ‘magit-remote-direct-configure’ option.  If ‘magit-remote’ already
     displays the variables for the upstream, then it does not make
     sense to invoke another transient that displays them for the same
     remote.  In that case this command prompts for a remote.

   The variables are described in *note Remote Git Variables::.

‘M a’     (‘magit-remote-add’)

     This command add a remote and fetches it.  The remote name and url
     are read in the minibuffer.

‘M r’     (‘magit-remote-rename’)

     This command renames a remote.  Both the old and the new names are
     read in the minibuffer.

‘M u’     (‘magit-remote-set-url’)

     This command changes the url of a remote.  Both the remote and the
     new url are read in the minibuffer.

‘M k’     (‘magit-remote-remove’)

     This command deletes a remote, read in the minibuffer.

‘M p’     (‘magit-remote-prune’)

     This command removes stale remote-tracking branches for a remote
     read in the minibuffer.

‘M P’     (‘magit-remote-prune-refspecs’)

     This command removes stale refspecs for a remote read in the
     minibuffer.

     A refspec is stale if there no longer exists at least one branch on
     the remote that would be fetched due to that refspec.  A stale
     refspec is problematic because its existence causes Git to refuse
     to fetch according to the remaining non-stale refspecs.

     If only stale refspecs remain, then this command offers to either
     delete the remote or to replace the stale refspecs with the default
     refspec ("+refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/REMOTE/*").

     This command also removes the remote-tracking branches that were
     created due to the now stale refspecs.  Other stale branches are
     not removed.

 -- User Option: magit-remote-add-set-remote.pushDefault

     This option controls whether the user is asked whether they want to
     set ‘remote.pushDefault’ after adding a remote.

     If ‘ask’, then users is always ask.  If ‘ask-if-unset’, then the
     user is only if the variable isn’t set already.  If ‘nil’, then the
     user isn’t asked and the variable isn’t set.  If the value is a
     string, then the variable is set without the user being asked,
     provided that the name of the added remote is equal to that string
     and the variable isn’t already set.


File: magit.info,  Node: Remote Git Variables,  Prev: Remote Commands,  Up: Remotes

7.1.2 Remote Git Variables
--------------------------

These variables can be set from the transient prefix command
‘magit-remote-configure’.  By default they can also be set from
‘magit-remote’.  See *note Remote Commands::.

 -- Variable: remote.NAME.url

     This variable specifies the url of the remote named NAME.  It can
     have multiple values.

 -- Variable: remote.NAME.fetch

     The refspec used when fetching from the remote named NAME.  It can
     have multiple values.

 -- Variable: remote.NAME.pushurl

     This variable specifies the url used for fetching from the remote
     named NAME.  If it is not specified, then ‘remote.NAME.url’ is used
     instead.  It can have multiple values.

 -- Variable: remote.NAME.push

     The refspec used when pushing to the remote named NAME.  It can
     have multiple values.

 -- Variable: remote.NAME.tagOpts

     This variable specifies what tags are fetched by default.  If the
     value is ‘--no-tags’ then no tags are fetched.  If the value is
     ‘--tags’, then all tags are fetched.  If this variable has no
     value, then only tags are fetched that are reachable from fetched
     branches.


File: magit.info,  Node: Fetching,  Next: Pulling,  Prev: Remotes,  Up: Transferring

7.2 Fetching
============

Also see *note (gitman)git-fetch::.  For information about the upstream
and the push-remote, see *note The Two Remotes::.

‘f’     (‘magit-fetch’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘f p’     (‘magit-fetch-from-pushremote’)

     This command fetches from the current push-remote.

     With a prefix argument or when the push-remote is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     push-remote.

‘f u’     (‘magit-fetch-from-upstream’)

     This command fetch from the upstream of the current branch.

     If the upstream is configured for the current branch and names an
     existing remote, then use that.  Otherwise try to use another
     remote: If only a single remote is configured, then use that.
     Otherwise if a remote named "origin" exists, then use that.

     If no remote can be determined, then this command is not available
     from the ‘magit-fetch’ transient prefix and invoking it directly
     results in an error.

‘f e’     (‘magit-fetch-other’)

     This command fetch from a repository read from the minibuffer.

‘f o’     (‘magit-fetch-branch’)

     This command fetches a branch from a remote, both of which are read
     from the minibuffer.

‘f r’     (‘magit-fetch-refspec’)

     This command fetches from a remote using an explicit refspec, both
     of which are read from the minibuffer.

‘f a’     (‘magit-fetch-all’)

     This command fetches from all remotes.

‘f m’     (‘magit-submodule-fetch’)

     This command fetches all submodules.  With a prefix argument it
     fetches all remotes of all submodules.

 -- User Option: magit-pull-or-fetch

     By default fetch and pull commands are available from separate
     transient prefix command.  Setting this to ‘t’ adds some (but not
     all) of the above suffix commands to the ‘magit-pull’ transient.

     If you do that, then you might also want to change the key binding
     for these prefix commands, e.g.:

          (setq magit-pull-or-fetch t)
          (define-key magit-mode-map "f" 'magit-pull) ; was magit-fetch
          (define-key magit-mode-map "F" nil)         ; was magit-pull


File: magit.info,  Node: Pulling,  Next: Pushing,  Prev: Fetching,  Up: Transferring

7.3 Pulling
===========

Also see *note (gitman)git-pull::.  For information about the upstream
and the push-remote, see *note The Two Remotes::.

‘F’     (‘magit-pull’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘F p’     (‘magit-pull-from-pushremote’)

     This command pulls from the push-remote of the current branch.

     With a prefix argument or when the push-remote is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     push-remote.

‘F u’     (‘magit-pull-from-upstream’)

     This command pulls from the upstream of the current branch.

     With a prefix argument or when the upstream is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     upstream.

‘F e’     (‘magit-pull-branch’)

     This command pulls from a branch read in the minibuffer.


File: magit.info,  Node: Pushing,  Next: Plain Patches,  Prev: Pulling,  Up: Transferring

7.4 Pushing
===========

Also see *note (gitman)git-push::.  For information about the upstream
and the push-remote, see *note The Two Remotes::.

‘P’     (‘magit-push’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘P p’     (‘magit-push-current-to-pushremote’)

     This command pushes the current branch to its push-remote.

     With a prefix argument or when the push-remote is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     push-remote.

‘P u’     (‘magit-push-current-to-upstream’)

     This command pushes the current branch to its upstream branch.

     With a prefix argument or when the upstream is either not
     configured or unusable, then let the user first configure the
     upstream.

‘P e’     (‘magit-push-current’)

     This command pushes the current branch to a branch read in the
     minibuffer.

‘P o’     (‘magit-push-other’)

     This command pushes an arbitrary branch or commit somewhere.  Both
     the source and the target are read in the minibuffer.

‘P r’     (‘magit-push-refspecs’)

     This command pushes one or multiple refspecs to a remote, both of
     which are read in the minibuffer.

     To use multiple refspecs, separate them with commas.  Completion is
     only available for the part before the colon, or when no colon is
     used.

‘P m’     (‘magit-push-matching’)

     This command pushes all matching branches to another repository.

     If only one remote exists, then push to that.  Otherwise prompt for
     a remote, offering the remote configured for the current branch as
     default.

‘P t’     (‘magit-push-tags’)

     This command pushes all tags to another repository.

     If only one remote exists, then push to that.  Otherwise prompt for
     a remote, offering the remote configured for the current branch as
     default.

‘P T’     (‘magit-push-tag’)

     This command pushes a tag to another repository.

   Two more push commands exist, which by default are not available from
the push transient.  See their doc-strings for instructions on how to
add them to the transient.

 -- Command: magit-push-implicitly args

     This command pushes somewhere without using an explicit refspec.

     This command simply runs ‘git push -v [ARGS]’.  ARGS are the infix
     arguments.  No explicit refspec arguments are used.  Instead the
     behavior depends on at least these Git variables: ‘push.default’,
     ‘remote.pushDefault’, ‘branch.<branch>.pushRemote’,
     ‘branch.<branch>.remote’, ‘branch.<branch>.merge’, and
     ‘remote.<remote>.push’.

 -- Command: magit-push-to-remote remote args

     This command pushes to the remote REMOTE without using an explicit
     refspec.  The remote is read in the minibuffer.

     This command simply runs ‘git push -v [ARGS] REMOTE’.  ARGS are the
     infix arguments.  No refspec arguments are used.  Instead the
     behavior depends on at least these Git variables: ‘push.default’,
     ‘remote.pushDefault’, ‘branch.<branch>.pushRemote’,
     ‘branch.<branch>.remote’, ‘branch.<branch>.merge’, and
     ‘remote.<remote>.push’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Plain Patches,  Next: Maildir Patches,  Prev: Pushing,  Up: Transferring

7.5 Plain Patches
=================

‘W’     (‘magit-patch’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘W c’     (‘magit-patch-create’)

     This command creates patches for a set commits.  If the region
     marks several commits, then it creates patches for all of them.
     Otherwise it functions as a transient prefix command, which
     features several infix arguments and binds itself as a suffix
     command.  When this command is invoked as a suffix of itself, then
     it creates a patch using the specified infix arguments.

‘w a’     (‘magit-patch-apply’)

     This command applies a patch.  This is a transient prefix command,
     which features several infix arguments and binds itself as a suffix
     command.  When this command is invoked as a suffix of itself, then
     it applies a patch using the specified infix arguments.

‘W s’     (‘magit-patch-save’)

     This command creates a patch from the current diff.

     Inside ‘magit-diff-mode’ or ‘magit-revision-mode’ buffers, ‘C-x
     C-w’ is also bound to this command.

   It is also possible to save a plain patch file by using ‘C-x C-w’
inside a ‘magit-diff-mode’ or ‘magit-revision-mode’ buffer.


File: magit.info,  Node: Maildir Patches,  Prev: Plain Patches,  Up: Transferring

7.6 Maildir Patches
===================

Also see *note (gitman)git-am::.  and *note (gitman)git-apply::.

‘w’     (‘magit-am’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘w w’     (‘magit-am-apply-patches’)

     This command applies one or more patches.  If the region marks
     files, then those are applied as patches.  Otherwise this command
     reads a file-name in the minibuffer, defaulting to the file at
     point.

‘w m’     (‘magit-am-apply-maildir’)

     This command applies patches from a maildir.

‘w a’     (‘magit-patch-apply’)

     This command applies a plain patch.  For a longer description see
     *note Plain Patches::.  This command is only available from the
     ‘magit-am’ transient for historic reasons.

   When an "am" operation is in progress, then the transient instead
features the following suffix commands.

‘w w’     (‘magit-am-continue’)

     This command resumes the current patch applying sequence.

‘w s’     (‘magit-am-skip’)

     This command skips the stopped at patch during a patch applying
     sequence.

‘w a’     (‘magit-am-abort’)

     This command aborts the current patch applying sequence.  This
     discards all changes made since the sequence started.


File: magit.info,  Node: Miscellaneous,  Next: Customizing,  Prev: Transferring,  Up: Top

8 Miscellaneous
***************

* Menu:

* Tagging::
* Notes::
* Submodules::
* Subtree::
* Worktree::
* Common Commands::
* Wip Modes::
* Minor Mode for Buffers Visiting Files::
* Minor Mode for Buffers Visiting Blobs::


File: magit.info,  Node: Tagging,  Next: Notes,  Up: Miscellaneous

8.1 Tagging
===========

Also see *note (gitman)git-tag::.

‘t’     (‘magit-tag’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘t t’     (‘magit-tag-create’)

     This command creates a new tag with the given NAME at REV.  With a
     prefix argument it creates an annotate tag.

‘t r’     (‘magit-tag-release’)

     This commands creates a release tag.  It assumes that release tags
     match ‘magit-release-tag-regexp’.

     First it prompts for the name of the new tag using the highest
     existing tag as initial input and leaving it to the user to
     increment the desired part of the version string.  If you use
     unconventional release tags or version numbers (e.g.,
     ‘v1.2.3-custom.1’), you can set the ‘magit-release-tag-regexp’ and
     ‘magit-tag-version-regexp-alist’ variables.

     If ‘--annotate’ is enabled then it prompts for the message of the
     new tag.  The proposed tag message is based on the message of the
     highest tag, provided that that contains the corresponding version
     string and substituting the new version string for that.  Otherwise
     it proposes something like "Foo-Bar 1.2.3", given, for example, a
     TAG "v1.2.3" and a repository located at something like
     "/path/to/foo-bar".

‘t k’     (‘magit-tag-delete’)

     This command deletes one or more tags.  If the region marks
     multiple tags (and nothing else), then it offers to delete those.
     Otherwise, it prompts for a single tag to be deleted, defaulting to
     the tag at point.

‘t p’     (‘magit-tag-prune’)

     This command offers to delete tags missing locally from REMOTE, and
     vice versa.


File: magit.info,  Node: Notes,  Next: Submodules,  Prev: Tagging,  Up: Miscellaneous

8.2 Notes
=========

Also see *note (gitman)git-notes::.

‘T’     (‘magit-notes’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘T T’     (‘magit-notes-edit’)

     Edit the note attached to a commit, defaulting to the commit at
     point.

     By default use the value of Git variable ‘core.notesRef’ or
     "refs/notes/commits" if that is undefined.

‘T r’     (‘magit-notes-remove’)

     Remove the note attached to a commit, defaulting to the commit at
     point.

     By default use the value of Git variable ‘core.notesRef’ or
     "refs/notes/commits" if that is undefined.

‘T p’     (‘magit-notes-prune’)

     Remove notes about unreachable commits.

   It is possible to merge one note ref into another.  That may result
in conflicts which have to resolved in the temporary worktree
".git/NOTES_MERGE_WORKTREE".

‘T m’     (‘magit-notes-merge’)

     Merge the notes of a ref read from the user into the current notes
     ref.  The current notes ref is the value of Git variable
     ‘core.notesRef’ or "refs/notes/commits" if that is undefined.

   When a notes merge is in progress then the transient features the
following suffix commands, instead of those listed above.

‘T c’     (‘magit-notes-merge-commit’)

     Commit the current notes ref merge, after manually resolving
     conflicts.

‘T a’     (‘magit-notes-merge-abort’)

     Abort the current notes ref merge.

   The following variables control what notes reference ‘magit-notes-*’,
‘git notes’ and ‘git show’ act on and display.  Both the local and
global values are displayed and can be modified.

 -- Variable: core.notesRef

     This variable specifies the notes ref that is displayed by default
     and which commands act on by default.

 -- Variable: notes.displayRef

     This variable specifies additional notes ref to be displayed in
     addition to the ref specified by ‘core.notesRef’.  It can have
     multiple values and may end with ‘*’ to display all refs in the
     ‘refs/notes/’ namespace (or ‘**’ if some names contain slashes).


File: magit.info,  Node: Submodules,  Next: Subtree,  Prev: Notes,  Up: Miscellaneous

8.3 Submodules
==============

Also see *note (gitman)git-submodule::.

* Menu:

* Listing Submodules::
* Submodule Transient::


File: magit.info,  Node: Listing Submodules,  Next: Submodule Transient,  Up: Submodules

8.3.1 Listing Submodules
------------------------

The command ‘magit-list-submodules’ displays a list of the current
repository’s submodules in a separate buffer.  It’s also possible to
display information about submodules directly in the status buffer of
the super-repository by adding ‘magit-insert-modules’ to the hook
‘magit-status-sections-hook’ as described in *note Status Module
Sections::.

 -- Command: magit-list-submodules

     This command displays a list of the current repository’s submodules
     in a separate buffer.

     It can be invoked by pressing ‘RET’ on the section titled
     "Modules".

 -- User Option: magit-submodule-list-columns

     This option controls what columns are displayed by the command
     ‘magit-list-submodules’ and how they are displayed.

     Each element has the form ‘(HEADER WIDTH FORMAT PROPS)’.

     HEADER is the string displayed in the header.  WIDTH is the width
     of the column.  FORMAT is a function that is called with one
     argument, the repository identification (usually its basename), and
     with ‘default-directory’ bound to the toplevel of its working tree.
     It has to return a string to be inserted or nil.  PROPS is an alist
     that supports the keys ‘:right-align’ and ‘:pad-right’.


File: magit.info,  Node: Submodule Transient,  Prev: Listing Submodules,  Up: Submodules

8.3.2 Submodule Transient
-------------------------

‘o’     (‘magit-submodule’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

   Some of the below commands default to act on the modules that are
selected using the region.  For brevity their description talk about
"the selected modules", but if no modules are selected, then they act on
the current module instead, or if point isn’t on a module, then the read
a single module to act on.  With a prefix argument these commands ignore
the selection and the current module and instead act on all suitable
modules.

‘o a’     (‘magit-submodule-add’)

     This commands adds the repository at URL as a module.  Optional
     PATH is the path to the module relative to the root of the
     super-project.  If it is nil then the path is determined based on
     URL.

‘o r’     (‘magit-submodule-register’)

     This command registers the selected modules by copying their urls
     from ".gitmodules" to "$GIT_DIR/config".  These values can then be
     edited before running ‘magit-submodule-populate’.  If you don’t
     need to edit any urls, then use the latter directly.

‘o p’     (‘magit-submodule-populate’)

     This command creates the working directory or directories of the
     selected modules, checking out the recorded commits.

‘o u’     (‘magit-submodule-update’)

     This command updates the selected modules checking out the recorded
     commits.

‘o s’     (‘magit-submodule-synchronize’)

     This command synchronizes the urls of the selected modules, copying
     the values from ".gitmodules" to the ".git/config" of the
     super-project as well those of the modules.

‘o d’     (‘magit-submodule-unpopulate’)

     This command removes the working directory of the selected modules.

‘o l’     (‘magit-list-submodules’)

     This command displays a list of the current repository’s modules.

‘o f’     (‘magit-fetch-modules’)

     This command fetches all modules.

     Option ‘magit-fetch-modules-jobs’ controls how many submodules are
     being fetched in parallel.  Also fetch the super-repository,
     because ‘git fetch’ does not support not doing that.  With a prefix
     argument fetch all remotes.


File: magit.info,  Node: Subtree,  Next: Worktree,  Prev: Submodules,  Up: Miscellaneous

8.4 Subtree
===========

Also see *note (gitman)git-subtree::.

‘O’     (‘magit-subtree’)

     This transient prefix command binds the two sub-transients; one for
     importing a subtree and one for exporting a subtree.

‘O i’     (‘magit-subtree-import’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

     The suffixes of this command import subtrees.

     If the ‘--prefix’ argument is set, then the suffix commands use
     that prefix without prompting the user.  If it is unset, then they
     read the prefix in the minibuffer.

‘O i a’     (‘magit-subtree-add’)

     This command adds COMMIT from REPOSITORY as a new subtree at
     PREFIX.

‘O i c’     (‘magit-subtree-add-commit’)

     This command add COMMIT as a new subtree at PREFIX.

‘O i m’     (‘magit-subtree-merge’)

     This command merges COMMIT into the PREFIX subtree.

‘O i f’     (‘magit-subtree-pull’)

     This command pulls COMMIT from REPOSITORY into the PREFIX subtree.

‘O e’     (‘magit-subtree-export’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     along with the appropriate infix arguments and displays them in a
     temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

     The suffixes of this command export subtrees.

     If the ‘--prefix’ argument is set, then the suffix commands use
     that prefix without prompting the user.  If it is unset, then they
     read the prefix in the minibuffer.

‘O e p’     (‘magit-subtree-push’)

     This command extract the history of the subtree PREFIX and pushes
     it to REF on REPOSITORY.

‘O e s’     (‘magit-subtree-split’)

     This command extracts the history of the subtree PREFIX.


File: magit.info,  Node: Worktree,  Next: Common Commands,  Prev: Subtree,  Up: Miscellaneous

8.5 Worktree
============

Also see *note (gitman)git-worktree::.

‘%’     (‘magit-worktree’)

     This transient prefix command binds the following suffix commands
     and displays them in a temporary buffer until a suffix is invoked.

‘% b’     (‘magit-worktree-checkout’)

     Checkout BRANCH in a new worktree at PATH.

‘% c’     (‘magit-worktree-branch’)

     Create a new BRANCH and check it out in a new worktree at PATH.

‘% m’     (‘magit-worktree-move’)

     Move an existing worktree to a new PATH.

‘% k’     (‘magit-worktree-delete’)

     Delete a worktree, defaulting to the worktree at point.  The
     primary worktree cannot be deleted.

‘% g’     (‘magit-worktree-status’)

     Show the status for the worktree at point.

     If there is no worktree at point, then read one in the minibuffer.
     If the worktree at point is the one whose status is already being
     displayed in the current buffer, then show it in Dired instead.


File: magit.info,  Node: Common Commands,  Next: Wip Modes,  Prev: Worktree,  Up: Miscellaneous

8.6 Common Commands
===================

These are some of the commands that can be used in all buffers whose
major-modes derive from ‘magit-mode’.  There are other common commands
beside the ones below, but these didn’t fit well anywhere else.

‘C-w’     (‘magit-copy-section-value’)

     This command saves the value of the current section to the
     ‘kill-ring’, and, provided that the current section is a commit,
     branch, or tag section, it also pushes the (referenced) revision to
     the ‘magit-revision-stack’.

     When the current section is a branch or a tag, and a prefix
     argument is used, then it saves the revision at its tip to the
     ‘kill-ring’ instead of the reference name.

     When the region is active, this command saves that to the
     ‘kill-ring’, like ‘kill-ring-save’ would, instead of behaving as
     described above.  If a prefix argument is used and the region is
     within a hunk, it strips the outer diff marker column before saving
     the text.

‘M-w’     (‘magit-copy-buffer-revision’)

     This command saves the revision being displayed in the current
     buffer to the ‘kill-ring’ and also pushes it to the
     ‘magit-revision-stack’.  It is mainly intended for use in
     ‘magit-revision-mode’ buffers, the only buffers where it is always
     unambiguous exactly which revision should be saved.

     Most other Magit buffers usually show more than one revision, in
     some way or another, so this command has to select one of them, and
     that choice might not always be the one you think would have been
     the best pick.

   Outside of Magit ‘M-w’ and ‘C-w’ are usually bound to
‘kill-ring-save’ and ‘kill-region’, and these commands would also be
useful in Magit buffers.  Therefore when the region is active, then both
of these commands behave like ‘kill-ring-save’ instead of as described
above.