git-commit-vandalism/Documentation/git-check-ref-format.txt
David J. Mellor cd747dc6dc Documentation: minor grammatical fix in git-check-ref-format.txt
Signed-off-by: David J. Mellor <dmellor@whistlingcat.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
2009-03-22 21:03:39 -07:00

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git-check-ref-format(1)
=======================
NAME
----
git-check-ref-format - Ensures that a reference name is well formed
SYNOPSIS
--------
'git check-ref-format' <refname>
DESCRIPTION
-----------
Checks if a given 'refname' is acceptable, and exits with a non-zero
status if it is not.
A reference is used in git to specify branches and tags. A
branch head is stored under the `$GIT_DIR/refs/heads` directory, and
a tag is stored under the `$GIT_DIR/refs/tags` directory. git
imposes the following rules on how references are named:
. They can include slash `/` for hierarchical (directory)
grouping, but no slash-separated component can begin with a
dot `.`.
. They cannot have two consecutive dots `..` anywhere.
. They cannot have ASCII control characters (i.e. bytes whose
values are lower than \040, or \177 `DEL`), space, tilde `~`,
caret `{caret}`, colon `:`, question-mark `?`, asterisk `*`,
or open bracket `[` anywhere.
. They cannot end with a slash `/`.
These rules make it easy for shell script based tools to parse
reference names, pathname expansion by the shell when a reference name is used
unquoted (by mistake), and also avoids ambiguities in certain
reference name expressions (see linkgit:git-rev-parse[1]):
. A double-dot `..` is often used as in `ref1..ref2`, and in some
contexts this notation means `{caret}ref1 ref2` (i.e. not in
`ref1` and in `ref2`).
. A tilde `~` and caret `{caret}` are used to introduce the postfix
'nth parent' and 'peel onion' operation.
. A colon `:` is used as in `srcref:dstref` to mean "use srcref\'s
value and store it in dstref" in fetch and push operations.
It may also be used to select a specific object such as with
'git-cat-file': "git cat-file blob v1.3.3:refs.c".
GIT
---
Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite