git-commit-vandalism/Documentation/git-am.txt
Junio C Hamano 9b0c7f308a am: refer to format-patch in the documentation
There were two reasons we didn't do this.  As "git am" is designed
to grok e-mailed patches, not necessarily taken out of a Git
repostiory or even if it came from a Git repository not necessarily
produced with format-patch, we didn't want to single it out as the
"blessed" input producer to the command.  Also, in the original
workflow that "git am" was invented for, the user of "am" was
expected to be a different person than the users of "format-patch".

But this is a very safe change to make in 2023.  Thanks to the
effort by many contributors, Git ended up becoming a bit more
popular than we initially thought it would be, and "format-patch",
which took me a few weeks to pursuade Linus to take in 2005, seems
to have become the de-facto standard tool to produce patch e-mails.

Interestingly, the documentation for "git apply", which is listed in
SEE ALSO section of "git am" documentation, does mention "am" and
"format-patch" as two things that are related but different from
"apply" in an early part.

Suggested-by: Kai Grossjohann <kai.grossjohann@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
2023-03-21 13:18:45 -07:00

284 lines
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git-am(1)
=========
NAME
----
git-am - Apply a series of patches from a mailbox
SYNOPSIS
--------
[verse]
'git am' [--signoff] [--keep] [--[no-]keep-cr] [--[no-]utf8] [--no-verify]
[--[no-]3way] [--interactive] [--committer-date-is-author-date]
[--ignore-date] [--ignore-space-change | --ignore-whitespace]
[--whitespace=<option>] [-C<n>] [-p<n>] [--directory=<dir>]
[--exclude=<path>] [--include=<path>] [--reject] [-q | --quiet]
[--[no-]scissors] [-S[<keyid>]] [--patch-format=<format>]
[--quoted-cr=<action>]
[--empty=(stop|drop|keep)]
[(<mbox> | <Maildir>)...]
'git am' (--continue | --skip | --abort | --quit | --show-current-patch[=(diff|raw)] | --allow-empty)
DESCRIPTION
-----------
Splits mail messages in a mailbox into commit log message,
authorship information and patches, and applies them to the
current branch. You could think of it as a reverse operation
of linkgit:git-format-patch[1] run on a branch with a straight
history without merges.
OPTIONS
-------
(<mbox>|<Maildir>)...::
The list of mailbox files to read patches from. If you do not
supply this argument, the command reads from the standard input.
If you supply directories, they will be treated as Maildirs.
-s::
--signoff::
Add a `Signed-off-by` trailer to the commit message, using
the committer identity of yourself.
See the signoff option in linkgit:git-commit[1] for more information.
-k::
--keep::
Pass `-k` flag to 'git mailinfo' (see linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]).
--keep-non-patch::
Pass `-b` flag to 'git mailinfo' (see linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]).
--[no-]keep-cr::
With `--keep-cr`, call 'git mailsplit' (see linkgit:git-mailsplit[1])
with the same option, to prevent it from stripping CR at the end of
lines. `am.keepcr` configuration variable can be used to specify the
default behaviour. `--no-keep-cr` is useful to override `am.keepcr`.
-c::
--scissors::
Remove everything in body before a scissors line (see
linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]). Can be activated by default using
the `mailinfo.scissors` configuration variable.
--no-scissors::
Ignore scissors lines (see linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]).
--quoted-cr=<action>::
This flag will be passed down to 'git mailinfo' (see linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]).
--empty=(stop|drop|keep)::
By default, or when the option is set to 'stop', the command
errors out on an input e-mail message lacking a patch
and stops into the middle of the current am session. When this
option is set to 'drop', skip such an e-mail message instead.
When this option is set to 'keep', create an empty commit,
recording the contents of the e-mail message as its log.
-m::
--message-id::
Pass the `-m` flag to 'git mailinfo' (see linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]),
so that the Message-ID header is added to the commit message.
The `am.messageid` configuration variable can be used to specify
the default behaviour.
--no-message-id::
Do not add the Message-ID header to the commit message.
`no-message-id` is useful to override `am.messageid`.
-q::
--quiet::
Be quiet. Only print error messages.
-u::
--utf8::
Pass `-u` flag to 'git mailinfo' (see linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]).
The proposed commit log message taken from the e-mail
is re-coded into UTF-8 encoding (configuration variable
`i18n.commitEncoding` can be used to specify project's
preferred encoding if it is not UTF-8).
+
This was optional in prior versions of git, but now it is the
default. You can use `--no-utf8` to override this.
--no-utf8::
Pass `-n` flag to 'git mailinfo' (see
linkgit:git-mailinfo[1]).
-3::
--3way::
--no-3way::
When the patch does not apply cleanly, fall back on
3-way merge if the patch records the identity of blobs
it is supposed to apply to and we have those blobs
available locally. `--no-3way` can be used to override
am.threeWay configuration variable. For more information,
see am.threeWay in linkgit:git-config[1].
include::rerere-options.txt[]
--ignore-space-change::
--ignore-whitespace::
--whitespace=<option>::
-C<n>::
-p<n>::
--directory=<dir>::
--exclude=<path>::
--include=<path>::
--reject::
These flags are passed to the 'git apply' (see linkgit:git-apply[1])
program that applies
the patch.
--patch-format::
By default the command will try to detect the patch format
automatically. This option allows the user to bypass the automatic
detection and specify the patch format that the patch(es) should be
interpreted as. Valid formats are mbox, mboxrd,
stgit, stgit-series and hg.
-i::
--interactive::
Run interactively.
-n::
--no-verify::
By default, the pre-applypatch and applypatch-msg hooks are run.
When any of `--no-verify` or `-n` is given, these are bypassed.
See also linkgit:githooks[5].
--committer-date-is-author-date::
By default the command records the date from the e-mail
message as the commit author date, and uses the time of
commit creation as the committer date. This allows the
user to lie about the committer date by using the same
value as the author date.
--ignore-date::
By default the command records the date from the e-mail
message as the commit author date, and uses the time of
commit creation as the committer date. This allows the
user to lie about the author date by using the same
value as the committer date.
--skip::
Skip the current patch. This is only meaningful when
restarting an aborted patch.
-S[<keyid>]::
--gpg-sign[=<keyid>]::
--no-gpg-sign::
GPG-sign commits. The `keyid` argument is optional and
defaults to the committer identity; if specified, it must be
stuck to the option without a space. `--no-gpg-sign` is useful to
countermand both `commit.gpgSign` configuration variable, and
earlier `--gpg-sign`.
--continue::
-r::
--resolved::
After a patch failure (e.g. attempting to apply
conflicting patch), the user has applied it by hand and
the index file stores the result of the application.
Make a commit using the authorship and commit log
extracted from the e-mail message and the current index
file, and continue.
--resolvemsg=<msg>::
When a patch failure occurs, <msg> will be printed
to the screen before exiting. This overrides the
standard message informing you to use `--continue`
or `--skip` to handle the failure. This is solely
for internal use between 'git rebase' and 'git am'.
--abort::
Restore the original branch and abort the patching operation.
Revert contents of files involved in the am operation to their
pre-am state.
--quit::
Abort the patching operation but keep HEAD and the index
untouched.
--show-current-patch[=(diff|raw)]::
Show the message at which `git am` has stopped due to
conflicts. If `raw` is specified, show the raw contents of
the e-mail message; if `diff`, show the diff portion only.
Defaults to `raw`.
--allow-empty::
After a patch failure on an input e-mail message lacking a patch,
create an empty commit with the contents of the e-mail message
as its log message.
DISCUSSION
----------
The commit author name is taken from the "From: " line of the
message, and commit author date is taken from the "Date: " line
of the message. The "Subject: " line is used as the title of
the commit, after stripping common prefix "[PATCH <anything>]".
The "Subject: " line is supposed to concisely describe what the
commit is about in one line of text.
"From: ", "Date: ", and "Subject: " lines starting the body override the
respective commit author name and title values taken from the headers.
The commit message is formed by the title taken from the
"Subject: ", a blank line and the body of the message up to
where the patch begins. Excess whitespace at the end of each
line is automatically stripped.
The patch is expected to be inline, directly following the
message. Any line that is of the form:
* three-dashes and end-of-line, or
* a line that begins with "diff -", or
* a line that begins with "Index: "
is taken as the beginning of a patch, and the commit log message
is terminated before the first occurrence of such a line.
When initially invoking `git am`, you give it the names of the mailboxes
to process. Upon seeing the first patch that does not apply, it
aborts in the middle. You can recover from this in one of two ways:
. skip the current patch by re-running the command with the `--skip`
option.
. hand resolve the conflict in the working directory, and update
the index file to bring it into a state that the patch should
have produced. Then run the command with the `--continue` option.
The command refuses to process new mailboxes until the current
operation is finished, so if you decide to start over from scratch,
run `git am --abort` before running the command with mailbox
names.
Before any patches are applied, ORIG_HEAD is set to the tip of the
current branch. This is useful if you have problems with multiple
commits, like running 'git am' on the wrong branch or an error in the
commits that is more easily fixed by changing the mailbox (e.g.
errors in the "From:" lines).
HOOKS
-----
This command can run `applypatch-msg`, `pre-applypatch`,
and `post-applypatch` hooks. See linkgit:githooks[5] for more
information.
CONFIGURATION
-------------
include::includes/cmd-config-section-all.txt[]
include::config/am.txt[]
SEE ALSO
--------
linkgit:git-apply[1],
linkgit:git-format-patch[1].
GIT
---
Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite