GIT-PUSH(1) Git Manual GIT-PUSH(1)
NAME
git-push - Update remote refs along with associated objects
SYNOPSIS
git push [--all | --mirror | --tags] [--follow-tags] [-n | --dry-run] [--receive-pack=<git-receive-pack>]
[--repo=<repository>] [-f | --force] [--prune] [-v | --verbose] [-u | --set-upstream]
[<repository> [<refspec>...]]
DESCRIPTION
Updates remote refs using local refs, while sending objects necessary to complete the given refs.
You can make interesting things happen to a repository every time you push into it, by setting up hooks there.
See documentation for git-receive-pack(1).
When the command line does not specify where to push with the <repository> argument, branch.*.remote
configuration for the current branch is consulted to determine where to push. If the configuration is missing,
it defaults to origin.
When the command line does not specify what to push with <refspec>... arguments or --all, --mirror, --tags
options, the command finds the default <refspec> by consulting remote.*.push configuration, and if it is not
found, honors push.default configuration to decide what to push (See gitlink:git-config[1] for the meaning of
push.default).
OPTIONS
<repository>
The "remote" repository that is destination of a push operation. This parameter can be either a URL (see
the section GIT URLS below) or the name of a remote (see the section REMOTES below).
<refspec>...
Specify what destination ref to update with what source object. The format of a <refspec> parameter is an
optional plus +, followed by the source object <src>, followed by a colon :, followed by the destination
ref <dst>.
The <src> is often the name of the branch you would want to push, but it can be any arbitrary "SHA-1
expression", such as master~4 or HEAD (see gitrevisions(7)).
The <dst> tells which ref on the remote side is updated with this push. Arbitrary expressions cannot be
used here, an actual ref must be named. If :<dst> is omitted, the same ref as <src> will be updated.
The object referenced by <src> is used to update the <dst> reference on the remote side. By default this
is only allowed if <dst> is not a tag (annotated or lightweight), and then only if it can fast-forward
<dst>. By having the optional leading +, you can tell Git to update the <dst> ref even if it is not
allowed by default (e.g., it is not a fast-forward.) This does not attempt to merge <src> into <dst>. See
EXAMPLES below for details.
tag <tag> means the same as refs/tags/<tag>:refs/tags/<tag>.
Pushing an empty <src> allows you to delete the <dst> ref from the remote repository.
The special refspec : (or +: to allow non-fast-forward updates) directs Git to push "matching" branches:
for every branch that exists on the local side, the remote side is updated if a branch of the same name
already exists on the remote side.
--all
Instead of naming each ref to push, specifies that all refs under refs/heads/ be pushed.
remote.<remote>.mirror is set.
-n, --dry-run
Do everything except actually send the updates.
--porcelain
Produce machine-readable output. The output status line for each ref will be tab-separated and sent to
stdout instead of stderr. The full symbolic names of the refs will be given.
--delete
All listed refs are deleted from the remote repository. This is the same as prefixing all refs with a
colon.
--tags
All refs under refs/tags are pushed, in addition to refspecs explicitly listed on the command line.
--follow-tags
Push all the refs that would be pushed without this option, and also push annotated tags in refs/tags that
are missing from the remote but are pointing at committish that are reachable from the refs being pushed.
--receive-pack=<git-receive-pack>, --exec=<git-receive-pack>
Path to the git-receive-pack program on the remote end. Sometimes useful when pushing to a remote
repository over ssh, and you do not have the program in a directory on the default $PATH.
-f, --force
Usually, the command refuses to update a remote ref that is not an ancestor of the local ref used to
overwrite it. This flag disables the check. This can cause the remote repository to lose commits; use it
with care.
--repo=<repository>
This option is only relevant if no <repository> argument is passed in the invocation. In this case, git
push derives the remote name from the current branch: If it tracks a remote branch, then that remote
repository is pushed to. Otherwise, the name "origin" is used. For this latter case, this option can be
used to override the name "origin". In other words, the difference between these two commands
git push public #1
git push --repo=public #2
is that #1 always pushes to "public" whereas #2 pushes to "public" only if the current branch does not
track a remote branch. This is useful if you write an alias or script around git push.
-u, --set-upstream
For every branch that is up to date or successfully pushed, add upstream (tracking) reference, used by
argument-less git-pull(1) and other commands. For more information, see branch.<name>.merge in git-
config(1).
--[no-]thin
These options are passed to git-send-pack(1). A thin transfer significantly reduces the amount of sent
data when the sender and receiver share many of the same objects in common. The default is --thin.
-q, --quiet
Suppress all output, including the listing of updated refs, unless an error occurs. Progress is not
reported to the standard error stream.
aborted and exit with non-zero status. If on-demand is used all submodules that changed in the revisions
to be pushed will be pushed. If on-demand was not able to push all necessary revisions it will also be
aborted and exit with non-zero status.
GIT URLS
In general, URLs contain information about the transport protocol, the address of the remote server, and the
path to the repository. Depending on the transport protocol, some of this information may be absent.
Git supports ssh, git, http, and https protocols (in addition, ftp, and ftps can be used for fetching and
rsync can be used for fetching and pushing, but these are inefficient and deprecated; do not use them).
The following syntaxes may be used with them:
· ssh://[user@]host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
· git://host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
· http[s]://host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
· ftp[s]://host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
· rsync://host.xz/path/to/repo.git/
An alternative scp-like syntax may also be used with the ssh protocol:
· [user@]host.xz:path/to/repo.git/
The ssh and git protocols additionally support ~username expansion:
· ssh://[user@]host.xz[:port]/~[user]/path/to/repo.git/
· git://host.xz[:port]/~[user]/path/to/repo.git/
· [user@]host.xz:/~[user]/path/to/repo.git/
For local repositories, also supported by Git natively, the following syntaxes may be used:
· /path/to/repo.git/
· file:///path/to/repo.git/
These two syntaxes are mostly equivalent, except when cloning, when the former implies --local option. See
git-clone(1) for details.
When Git doesn’t know how to handle a certain transport protocol, it attempts to use the remote-<transport>
remote helper, if one exists. To explicitly request a remote helper, the following syntax may be used:
· <transport>::<address>
where <address> may be a path, a server and path, or an arbitrary URL-like string recognized by the specific
remote helper being invoked. See gitremote-helpers(1) for details.
If there are a large number of similarly-named remote repositories and you want to use a different format for
them (such that the URLs you use will be rewritten into URLs that work), you can create a configuration
a URL like "work:repo.git" or like "host.xz:/path/to/repo.git" will be rewritten in any context that takes a
URL to be "git://git.host.xz/repo.git".
If you want to rewrite URLs for push only, you can create a configuration section of the form:
[url "<actual url base>"]
pushInsteadOf = <other url base>
For example, with this:
[url "ssh://example.org/"]
pushInsteadOf = git://example.org/
a URL like "git://example.org/path/to/repo.git" will be rewritten to "ssh://example.org/path/to/repo.git" for
pushes, but pulls will still use the original URL.
REMOTES
The name of one of the following can be used instead of a URL as <repository> argument:
· a remote in the Git configuration file: $GIT_DIR/config,
· a file in the $GIT_DIR/remotes directory, or
· a file in the $GIT_DIR/branches directory.
All of these also allow you to omit the refspec from the command line because they each contain a refspec
which git will use by default.
Named remote in configuration file
You can choose to provide the name of a remote which you had previously configured using git-remote(1), git-
config(1) or even by a manual edit to the $GIT_DIR/config file. The URL of this remote will be used to access
the repository. The refspec of this remote will be used by default when you do not provide a refspec on the
command line. The entry in the config file would appear like this:
[remote "<name>"]
url = <url>
pushurl = <pushurl>
push = <refspec>
fetch = <refspec>
The <pushurl> is used for pushes only. It is optional and defaults to <url>.
Named file in $GIT_DIR/remotes
You can choose to provide the name of a file in $GIT_DIR/remotes. The URL in this file will be used to access
the repository. The refspec in this file will be used as default when you do not provide a refspec on the
command line. This file should have the following format:
URL: one of the above URL format
Push: <refspec>
Pull: <refspec>
<url> is required; #<head> is optional.
Depending on the operation, git will use one of the following refspecs, if you don’t provide one on the
command line. <branch> is the name of this file in $GIT_DIR/branches and <head> defaults to master.
git fetch uses:
refs/heads/<head>:refs/heads/<branch>
git push uses:
HEAD:refs/heads/<head>
OUTPUT
The output of "git push" depends on the transport method used; this section describes the output when pushing
over the Git protocol (either locally or via ssh).
The status of the push is output in tabular form, with each line representing the status of a single ref. Each
line is of the form:
<flag> <summary> <from> -> <to> (<reason>)
If --porcelain is used, then each line of the output is of the form:
<flag> \t <from>:<to> \t <summary> (<reason>)
The status of up-to-date refs is shown only if --porcelain or --verbose option is used.
flag
A single character indicating the status of the ref:
(space)
for a successfully pushed fast-forward;
+
for a successful forced update;
-
for a successfully deleted ref;
*
for a successfully pushed new ref;
!
for a ref that was rejected or failed to push; and
=
for a ref that was up to date and did not need pushing.
summary
repository has one of the following safety options in effect: receive.denyCurrentBranch (for pushes to
the checked out branch), receive.denyNonFastForwards (for forced non-fast-forward updates),
receive.denyDeletes or receive.denyDeleteCurrent. See git-config(1).
remote failure
The remote end did not report the successful update of the ref, perhaps because of a temporary error
on the remote side, a break in the network connection, or other transient error.
from
The name of the local ref being pushed, minus its refs/<type>/ prefix. In the case of deletion, the name
of the local ref is omitted.
to
The name of the remote ref being updated, minus its refs/<type>/ prefix.
reason
A human-readable explanation. In the case of successfully pushed refs, no explanation is needed. For a
failed ref, the reason for failure is described.
NOTE ABOUT FAST-FORWARDS
When an update changes a branch (or more in general, a ref) that used to point at commit A to point at another
commit B, it is called a fast-forward update if and only if B is a descendant of A.
In a fast-forward update from A to B, the set of commits that the original commit A built on top of is a
subset of the commits the new commit B builds on top of. Hence, it does not lose any history.
In contrast, a non-fast-forward update will lose history. For example, suppose you and somebody else started
at the same commit X, and you built a history leading to commit B while the other person built a history
leading to commit A. The history looks like this:
B
/
---X---A
Further suppose that the other person already pushed changes leading to A back to the original repository from
which you two obtained the original commit X.
The push done by the other person updated the branch that used to point at commit X to point at commit A. It
is a fast-forward.
But if you try to push, you will attempt to update the branch (that now points at A) with commit B. This does
not fast-forward. If you did so, the changes introduced by commit A will be lost, because everybody will now
start building on top of B.
The command by default does not allow an update that is not a fast-forward to prevent such loss of history.
If you do not want to lose your work (history from X to B) nor the work by the other person (history from X to
A), you would need to first fetch the history from the repository, create a history that contains changes done
by both parties, and push the result back.
You can perform "git pull", resolve potential conflicts, and "git push" the result. A "git pull" will create a
merge commit C between commits A and B.
---X---A
Again, updating A with this commit will fast-forward and your push will be accepted.
There is another common situation where you may encounter non-fast-forward rejection when you try to push, and
it is possible even when you are pushing into a repository nobody else pushes into. After you push commit A
yourself (in the first picture in this section), replace it with "git commit --amend" to produce commit B, and
you try to push it out, because forgot that you have pushed A out already. In such a case, and only if you are
certain that nobody in the meantime fetched your earlier commit A (and started building on top of it), you can
run "git push --force" to overwrite it. In other words, "git push --force" is a method reserved for a case
where you do mean to lose history.
EXAMPLES
git push
Works like git push <remote>, where <remote> is the current branch’s remote (or origin, if no remote is
configured for the current branch).
git push origin
Without additional configuration, works like git push origin :.
The default behavior of this command when no <refspec> is given can be configured by setting the push
option of the remote, or the push.default configuration variable.
For example, to default to pushing only the current branch to origin use git config remote.origin.push
HEAD. Any valid <refspec> (like the ones in the examples below) can be configured as the default for git
push origin.
git push origin :
Push "matching" branches to origin. See <refspec> in the OPTIONS section above for a description of
"matching" branches.
git push origin master
Find a ref that matches master in the source repository (most likely, it would find refs/heads/master),
and update the same ref (e.g. refs/heads/master) in origin repository with it. If master did not exist
remotely, it would be created.
git push origin HEAD
A handy way to push the current branch to the same name on the remote.
git push mothership master:satellite/master dev:satellite/dev
Use the source ref that matches master (e.g. refs/heads/master) to update the ref that matches
satellite/master (most probably refs/remotes/satellite/master) in the mothership repository; do the same
for dev and satellite/dev.
This is to emulate git fetch run on the mothership using git push that is run in the opposite direction in
order to integrate the work done on satellite, and is often necessary when you can only make connection in
one way (i.e. satellite can ssh into mothership but mothership cannot initiate connection to satellite
because the latter is behind a firewall or does not run sshd).
After running this git push on the satellite machine, you would ssh into the mothership and run git merge
there to complete the emulation of git pull that were run on mothership to pull changes made on satellite.
git push origin HEAD:master
git push origin +dev:master
Update the origin repository’s master branch with the dev branch, allowing non-fast-forward updates. This
can leave unreferenced commits dangling in the origin repository. Consider the following situation, where
a fast-forward is not possible:
o---o---o---A---B origin/master
\
X---Y---Z dev
The above command would change the origin repository to
A---B (unnamed branch)
/
o---o---o---X---Y---Z master
Commits A and B would no longer belong to a branch with a symbolic name, and so would be unreachable. As
such, these commits would be removed by a git gc command on the origin repository.
GIT
Part of the git(1) suite
Git 1.8.3.1 03/23/2016 GIT-PUSH(1)
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