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