Documentation/git-help.txt

   1 git-help(1)
   2 ===========
   3
   4 NAME
   5 ----
   6 git-help - Display help information about Git
   7
   8 SYNOPSIS
   9 --------
  10 [verse]
  11 'git help' [-a|--all [--[no-]verbose]]
  12            [[-i|--info] [-m|--man] [-w|--web]] [<command>|<guide>]
  13 'git help' [-g|--guides]
  14 'git help' [-c|--config]
  15
  16 DESCRIPTION
  17 -----------
  18
  19 With no options and no '<command>' or '<guide>' given, the synopsis of the 'git'
  20 command and a list of the most commonly used Git commands are printed
  21 on the standard output.
  22
  23 If the option `--all` or `-a` is given, all available commands are
  24 printed on the standard output.
  25
  26 If the option `--guides` or `-g` is given, a list of the
  27 Git concept guides is also printed on the standard output.
  28
  29 If a command, or a guide, is given, a manual page for that command or
  30 guide is brought up. The 'man' program is used by default for this
  31 purpose, but this can be overridden by other options or configuration
  32 variables.
  33
  34 If an alias is given, git shows the definition of the alias on
  35 standard output. To get the manual page for the aliased command, use
  36 `git <command> --help`.
  37
  38 Note that `git --help ...` is identical to `git help ...` because the
  39 former is internally converted into the latter.
  40
  41 To display the linkgit:git[1] man page, use `git help git`.
  42
  43 This page can be displayed with 'git help help' or `git help --help`
  44
  45 OPTIONS
  46 -------
  47 -a::
  48 --all::
  49         Prints all the available commands on the standard output. This
  50         option overrides any given command or guide name.
  51
  52 --verbose::
  53         When used with `--all` print description for all recognized
  54         commands. This is the default.
  55
  56 -c::
  57 --config::
  58         List all available configuration variables. This is a short
  59         summary of the list in linkgit:git-config[1].
  60
  61 -g::
  62 --guides::
  63         Prints a list of the Git concept guides on the standard output.
  64
  65 -i::
  66 --info::
  67         Display manual page for the command in the 'info' format. The
  68         'info' program will be used for that purpose.
  69
  70 -m::
  71 --man::
  72         Display manual page for the command in the 'man' format. This
  73         option may be used to override a value set in the
  74         `help.format` configuration variable.
  75 +
  76 By default the 'man' program will be used to display the manual page,
  77 but the `man.viewer` configuration variable may be used to choose
  78 other display programs (see below).
  79
  80 -w::
  81 --web::
  82         Display manual page for the command in the 'web' (HTML)
  83         format. A web browser will be used for that purpose.
  84 +
  85 The web browser can be specified using the configuration variable
  86 `help.browser`, or `web.browser` if the former is not set. If none of
  87 these config variables is set, the 'git web{litdd}browse' helper script
  88 (called by 'git help') will pick a suitable default. See
  89 linkgit:git-web{litdd}browse[1] for more information about this.
  90
  91 CONFIGURATION VARIABLES
  92 -----------------------
  93
  94 help.format
  95 ~~~~~~~~~~~
  96
  97 If no command-line option is passed, the `help.format` configuration
  98 variable will be checked. The following values are supported for this
  99 variable; they make 'git help' behave as their corresponding command-
 100 line option:
 101
 102 * "man" corresponds to '-m|--man',
 103 * "info" corresponds to '-i|--info',
 104 * "web" or "html" correspond to '-w|--web'.
 105
 106 help.browser, web.browser and browser.<tool>.path
 107 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 108
 109 The `help.browser`, `web.browser` and `browser.<tool>.path` will also
 110 be checked if the 'web' format is chosen (either by command-line
 111 option or configuration variable). See '-w|--web' in the OPTIONS
 112 section above and linkgit:git-web{litdd}browse[1].
 113
 114 man.viewer
 115 ~~~~~~~~~~
 116
 117 The `man.viewer` configuration variable will be checked if the 'man'
 118 format is chosen. The following values are currently supported:
 119
 120 * "man": use the 'man' program as usual,
 121 * "woman": use 'emacsclient' to launch the "woman" mode in emacs
 122   (this only works starting with emacsclient versions 22),
 123 * "konqueror": use 'kfmclient' to open the man page in a new konqueror
 124   tab (see 'Note about konqueror' below).
 125
 126 Values for other tools can be used if there is a corresponding
 127 `man.<tool>.cmd` configuration entry (see below).
 128
 129 Multiple values may be given to the `man.viewer` configuration
 130 variable. Their corresponding programs will be tried in the order
 131 listed in the configuration file.
 132
 133 For example, this configuration:
 134
 135 ------------------------------------------------
 136         [man]
 137                 viewer = konqueror
 138                 viewer = woman
 139 ------------------------------------------------
 140
 141 will try to use konqueror first. But this may fail (for example, if
 142 DISPLAY is not set) and in that case emacs' woman mode will be tried.
 143
 144 If everything fails, or if no viewer is configured, the viewer specified
 145 in the `GIT_MAN_VIEWER` environment variable will be tried.  If that
 146 fails too, the 'man' program will be tried anyway.
 147
 148 man.<tool>.path
 149 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 150
 151 You can explicitly provide a full path to your preferred man viewer by
 152 setting the configuration variable `man.<tool>.path`. For example, you
 153 can configure the absolute path to konqueror by setting
 154 'man.konqueror.path'. Otherwise, 'git help' assumes the tool is
 155 available in PATH.
 156
 157 man.<tool>.cmd
 158 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 159
 160 When the man viewer, specified by the `man.viewer` configuration
 161 variables, is not among the supported ones, then the corresponding
 162 `man.<tool>.cmd` configuration variable will be looked up. If this
 163 variable exists then the specified tool will be treated as a custom
 164 command and a shell eval will be used to run the command with the man
 165 page passed as arguments.
 166
 167 Note about konqueror
 168 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 169
 170 When 'konqueror' is specified in the `man.viewer` configuration
 171 variable, we launch 'kfmclient' to try to open the man page on an
 172 already opened konqueror in a new tab if possible.
 173
 174 For consistency, we also try such a trick if 'man.konqueror.path' is
 175 set to something like `A_PATH_TO/konqueror`. That means we will try to
 176 launch `A_PATH_TO/kfmclient` instead.
 177
 178 If you really want to use 'konqueror', then you can use something like
 179 the following:
 180
 181 ------------------------------------------------
 182         [man]
 183                 viewer = konq
 184
 185         [man "konq"]
 186                 cmd = A_PATH_TO/konqueror
 187 ------------------------------------------------
 188
 189 Note about git config --global
 190 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 191
 192 Note that all these configuration variables should probably be set
 193 using the `--global` flag, for example like this:
 194
 195 ------------------------------------------------
 196 $ git config --global help.format web
 197 $ git config --global web.browser firefox
 198 ------------------------------------------------
 199
 200 as they are probably more user specific than repository specific.
 201 See linkgit:git-config[1] for more information about this.
 202
 203 GIT
 204 ---
 205 Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite