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  • 5 commits
  • 3 files changed
  • 1 contributor

Commits on Feb 17, 2026

  1. builtin/history: perform revwalk checks before asking for user input 

    When setting up the revision walk in git-history(1) we also perform some
verifications whether the request actually looks sane. Unfortunately,
these verifications come _after_ we have already asked the user for the
commit message of the commit that is to be rewritten. So in case any of
the verifications fails, the user will have lost their modifications.

Extract the function to set up the revision walk and call it before we
ask for user input to fix this.

Adapt one of the tests that is expected to fail because of this check
to use false(1) as editor. If the editor had been executed by Git, it
would fail with the error message "Aborting commit as launching the
editor failed."

Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
    @pks-t @gitster
    pks-t authored and gitster committed Feb 17, 2026
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  2. builtin/history: check for merges before asking for user input 

    The replay infrastructure is not yet capable of replaying merge commits.
Unfortunately, we only notice that we're about to replay merges after we
have already asked the user for input, so any commit message that the
user may have written will be discarded in that case.

Fix this by checking whether the revwalk contains merge commits before
we ask for user input.

Adapt one of the tests that is expected to fail because of this check
to use false(1) as editor. If the editor had been executed by Git, it
would fail with the error message "Aborting commit as launching the
editor failed."

Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
    @pks-t @gitster
    pks-t authored and gitster committed Feb 17, 2026
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  3. builtin/history: replace "--ref-action=print" with "--dry-run" 

    The git-history(1) command has the ability to perform a dry-run
that will not end up modifying any references. Instead, we'll only print
any ref updates that would happen as a consequence of performing the
operation.

This mode is somewhat hidden though behind the "--ref-action=print"
option. This command line option has its origin in git-replay(1), where
it's probably an okayish interface as this command is sitting more on
the plumbing side of tools. But git-history(1) is a user-facing tool,
and this way of achieving a dry-run is way too technical and thus not
very discoverable.

Besides usability issues, it also has another issue: the dry-run mode
will always operate as if the user wanted to rewrite all branches. But
in fact, the user also has the option to only update the HEAD reference,
and they might want to perform a dry-run of such an operation, too. We
could of course introduce "--ref-action=print-head", but that would
become even less ergonomic.

Replace "--ref-action=print" with a new "--dry-run" toggle. This new
toggle works with both "--ref-action={head,branches}" and is way more
discoverable.

Add a test to verify that both "--ref-action=" values behave as
expected.

This patch is best viewed with "--ignore-space-change".

Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
    @pks-t @gitster
    pks-t authored and gitster committed Feb 17, 2026
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  4. builtin/history: rename "--ref-action=" to "--update-refs=" 

    With the preceding commit we have changed "--ref-action=" to only
control which refs are supposed to be updated, not what happens with
them. As a consequence, the option is now somewhat misnamed, as we don't
control the action itself anymore.

Rename it to "--update-refs=" to better align it with its new use.

Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
    @pks-t @gitster
    pks-t authored and gitster committed Feb 17, 2026
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  5. Documentation/git-history: document default for "--update-refs=" 

    While we document the values that can be passed to the "--update-refs="
option, we don't give the user any hint what the default behaviour is.
Document it.

Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
    @pks-t @gitster
    pks-t authored and gitster committed Feb 17, 2026
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