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            "text": "# gitglossary(7) (man)\n\n**Summary:** gitglossary - A Git Glossary\n\n**Synopsis:** *\n\n## See Also\n\n- gittutorial(7)\n- gittutorial-2(7)\n- gitcvs-migration(7)\n- giteveryday(7)\n\n## Section Outline\n\n- **NAME** (2 lines)\n- **SYNOPSIS** (2 lines)\n- **DESCRIPTION** (514 lines)\n- **SEE ALSO** (3 lines)\n- **GIT** (2 lines)\n- **NOTES** (6 lines)\n\n## Full Content\n\n### NAME\n\ngitglossary - A Git Glossary\n\n### SYNOPSIS\n\n*\n\n### DESCRIPTION\n\nalternate object database\nVia the alternates mechanism, a repository can inherit part of its object database from\nanother object database, which is called an \"alternate\".\n\nbare repository\nA bare repository is normally an appropriately named directory with a .git suffix that\ndoes not have a locally checked-out copy of any of the files under revision control. That\nis, all of the Git administrative and control files that would normally be present in the\nhidden .git sub-directory are directly present in the repository.git directory instead,\nand no other files are present and checked out. Usually publishers of public repositories\nmake bare repositories available.\n\nblob object\nUntyped object, e.g. the contents of a file.\n\nbranch\nA \"branch\" is a line of development. The most recent commit on a branch is referred to as\nthe tip of that branch. The tip of the branch is referenced by a branch head, which moves\nforward as additional development is done on the branch. A single Git repository can\ntrack an arbitrary number of branches, but your working tree is associated with just one\nof them (the \"current\" or \"checked out\" branch), and HEAD points to that branch.\n\ncache\nObsolete for: index.\n\nchain\nA list of objects, where each object in the list contains a reference to its successor\n(for example, the successor of a commit could be one of its parents).\n\nchangeset\nBitKeeper/cvsps speak for \"commit\". Since Git does not store changes, but states, it\nreally does not make sense to use the term \"changesets\" with Git.\n\ncheckout\nThe action of updating all or part of the working tree with a tree object or blob from\nthe object database, and updating the index and HEAD if the whole working tree has been\npointed at a new branch.\n\ncherry-picking\nIn SCM jargon, \"cherry pick\" means to choose a subset of changes out of a series of\nchanges (typically commits) and record them as a new series of changes on top of a\ndifferent codebase. In Git, this is performed by the \"git cherry-pick\" command to extract\nthe change introduced by an existing commit and to record it based on the tip of the\ncurrent branch as a new commit.\n\nclean\nA working tree is clean, if it corresponds to the revision referenced by the current\nhead. Also see \"dirty\".\n\ncommit\nAs a noun: A single point in the Git history; the entire history of a project is\nrepresented as a set of interrelated commits. The word \"commit\" is often used by Git in\nthe same places other revision control systems use the words \"revision\" or \"version\".\nAlso used as a short hand for commit object.\n\nAs a verb: The action of storing a new snapshot of the project’s state in the Git\nhistory, by creating a new commit representing the current state of the index and\nadvancing HEAD to point at the new commit.\n\ncommit object\nAn object which contains the information about a particular revision, such as parents,\ncommitter, author, date and the tree object which corresponds to the top directory of the\nstored revision.\n\ncommit-ish (also committish)\nA commit object or an object that can be recursively dereferenced to a commit object. The\nfollowing are all commit-ishes: a commit object, a tag object that points to a commit\nobject, a tag object that points to a tag object that points to a commit object, etc.\n\ncore Git\nFundamental data structures and utilities of Git. Exposes only limited source code\nmanagement tools.\n\nDAG\nDirected acyclic graph. The commit objects form a directed acyclic graph, because they\nhave parents (directed), and the graph of commit objects is acyclic (there is no chain\nwhich begins and ends with the same object).\n\ndangling object\nAn unreachable object which is not reachable even from other unreachable objects; a\ndangling object has no references to it from any reference or object in the repository.\n\ndetached HEAD\nNormally the HEAD stores the name of a branch, and commands that operate on the history\nHEAD represents operate on the history leading to the tip of the branch the HEAD points\nat. However, Git also allows you to check out an arbitrary commit that isn’t necessarily\nthe tip of any particular branch. The HEAD in such a state is called \"detached\".\n\nNote that commands that operate on the history of the current branch (e.g.  git commit to\nbuild a new history on top of it) still work while the HEAD is detached. They update the\nHEAD to point at the tip of the updated history without affecting any branch. Commands\nthat update or inquire information about the current branch (e.g.  git branch\n--set-upstream-to that sets what remote-tracking branch the current branch integrates\nwith) obviously do not work, as there is no (real) current branch to ask about in this\nstate.\n\ndirectory\nThe list you get with \"ls\" :-)\n\ndirty\nA working tree is said to be \"dirty\" if it contains modifications which have not been\ncommitted to the current branch.\n\nevil merge\nAn evil merge is a merge that introduces changes that do not appear in any parent.\n\nfast-forward\nA fast-forward is a special type of merge where you have a revision and you are \"merging\"\nanother branch's changes that happen to be a descendant of what you have. In such a case,\nyou do not make a new merge commit but instead just update your branch to point at the\nsame revision as the branch you are merging. This will happen frequently on a\nremote-tracking branch of a remote repository.\n\nfetch\nFetching a branch means to get the branch’s head ref from a remote repository, to find\nout which objects are missing from the local object database, and to get them, too. See\nalso git-fetch(1).\n\nfile system\nLinus Torvalds originally designed Git to be a user space file system, i.e. the\ninfrastructure to hold files and directories. That ensured the efficiency and speed of\nGit.\n\nGit archive\nSynonym for repository (for arch people).\n\ngitfile\nA plain file .git at the root of a working tree that points at the directory that is the\nreal repository.\n\ngrafts\nGrafts enables two otherwise different lines of development to be joined together by\nrecording fake ancestry information for commits. This way you can make Git pretend the\nset of parents a commit has is different from what was recorded when the commit was\ncreated. Configured via the .git/info/grafts file.\n\nNote that the grafts mechanism is outdated and can lead to problems transferring objects\nbetween repositories; see git-replace(1) for a more flexible and robust system to do the\nsame thing.\n\nhash\nIn Git’s context, synonym for object name.\n\nhead\nA named reference to the commit at the tip of a branch. Heads are stored in a file in\n$GITDIR/refs/heads/ directory, except when using packed refs. (See git-pack-refs(1).)\n\nHEAD\nThe current branch. In more detail: Your working tree is normally derived from the state\nof the tree referred to by HEAD. HEAD is a reference to one of the heads in your\nrepository, except when using a detached HEAD, in which case it directly references an\narbitrary commit.\n\nhead ref\nA synonym for head.\n\nhook\nDuring the normal execution of several Git commands, call-outs are made to optional\nscripts that allow a developer to add functionality or checking. Typically, the hooks\nallow for a command to be pre-verified and potentially aborted, and allow for a\npost-notification after the operation is done. The hook scripts are found in the\n$GITDIR/hooks/ directory, and are enabled by simply removing the .sample suffix from the\nfilename. In earlier versions of Git you had to make them executable.\n\nindex\nA collection of files with stat information, whose contents are stored as objects. The\nindex is a stored version of your working tree. Truth be told, it can also contain a\nsecond, and even a third version of a working tree, which are used when merging.\n\nindex entry\nThe information regarding a particular file, stored in the index. An index entry can be\nunmerged, if a merge was started, but not yet finished (i.e. if the index contains\nmultiple versions of that file).\n\nmaster\nThe default development branch. Whenever you create a Git repository, a branch named\n\"master\" is created, and becomes the active branch. In most cases, this contains the\nlocal development, though that is purely by convention and is not required.\n\nmerge\nAs a verb: To bring the contents of another branch (possibly from an external repository)\ninto the current branch. In the case where the merged-in branch is from a different\nrepository, this is done by first fetching the remote branch and then merging the result\ninto the current branch. This combination of fetch and merge operations is called a pull.\nMerging is performed by an automatic process that identifies changes made since the\nbranches diverged, and then applies all those changes together. In cases where changes\nconflict, manual intervention may be required to complete the merge.\n\nAs a noun: unless it is a fast-forward, a successful merge results in the creation of a\nnew commit representing the result of the merge, and having as parents the tips of the\nmerged branches. This commit is referred to as a \"merge commit\", or sometimes just a\n\"merge\".\n\nobject\nThe unit of storage in Git. It is uniquely identified by the SHA-1 of its contents.\nConsequently, an object cannot be changed.\n\nobject database\nStores a set of \"objects\", and an individual object is identified by its object name. The\nobjects usually live in $GITDIR/objects/.\n\nobject identifier\nSynonym for object name.\n\nobject name\nThe unique identifier of an object. The object name is usually represented by a 40\ncharacter hexadecimal string. Also colloquially called SHA-1.\n\nobject type\nOne of the identifiers \"commit\", \"tree\", \"tag\" or \"blob\" describing the type of an\nobject.\n\noctopus\nTo merge more than two branches.\n\norigin\nThe default upstream repository. Most projects have at least one upstream project which\nthey track. By default origin is used for that purpose. New upstream updates will be\nfetched into remote-tracking branches named origin/name-of-upstream-branch, which you can\nsee using git branch -r.\n\noverlay\nOnly update and add files to the working directory, but don’t delete them, similar to how\ncp -R would update the contents in the destination directory. This is the default mode in\na checkout when checking out files from the index or a tree-ish. In contrast, no-overlay\nmode also deletes tracked files not present in the source, similar to rsync --delete.\n\npack\nA set of objects which have been compressed into one file (to save space or to transmit\nthem efficiently).\n\npack index\nThe list of identifiers, and other information, of the objects in a pack, to assist in\nefficiently accessing the contents of a pack.\n\npathspec\nPattern used to limit paths in Git commands.\n\nPathspecs are used on the command line of \"git ls-files\", \"git ls-tree\", \"git add\", \"git\ngrep\", \"git diff\", \"git checkout\", and many other commands to limit the scope of\noperations to some subset of the tree or worktree. See the documentation of each command\nfor whether paths are relative to the current directory or toplevel. The pathspec syntax\nis as follows:\n\n•   any path matches itself\n\n•   the pathspec up to the last slash represents a directory prefix. The scope of that\npathspec is limited to that subtree.\n\n•   the rest of the pathspec is a pattern for the remainder of the pathname. Paths\nrelative to the directory prefix will be matched against that pattern using\nfnmatch(3); in particular, * and ?  can match directory separators.\n\nFor example, Documentation/*.jpg will match all .jpg files in the Documentation subtree,\nincluding Documentation/chapter1/figure1.jpg.\n\nA pathspec that begins with a colon : has special meaning. In the short form, the leading\ncolon : is followed by zero or more \"magic signature\" letters (which optionally is\nterminated by another colon :), and the remainder is the pattern to match against the\npath. The \"magic signature\" consists of ASCII symbols that are neither alphanumeric,\nglob, regex special characters nor colon. The optional colon that terminates the \"magic\nsignature\" can be omitted if the pattern begins with a character that does not belong to\n\"magic signature\" symbol set and is not a colon.\n\nIn the long form, the leading colon : is followed by an open parenthesis (, a\ncomma-separated list of zero or more \"magic words\", and a close parentheses ), and the\nremainder is the pattern to match against the path.\n\nA pathspec with only a colon means \"there is no pathspec\". This form should not be\ncombined with other pathspec.\n\ntop\nThe magic word top (magic signature: /) makes the pattern match from the root of the\nworking tree, even when you are running the command from inside a subdirectory.\n\nliteral\nWildcards in the pattern such as * or ?  are treated as literal characters.\n\nicase\nCase insensitive match.\n\nglob\nGit treats the pattern as a shell glob suitable for consumption by fnmatch(3) with\nthe FNMPATHNAME flag: wildcards in the pattern will not match a / in the pathname.\nFor example, \"Documentation/*.html\" matches \"Documentation/git.html\" but not\n\"Documentation/ppc/ppc.html\" or \"tools/perf/Documentation/perf.html\".\n\nTwo consecutive asterisks (\"\") in patterns matched against full pathname may have\nspecial meaning:\n\n•   A leading \"\" followed by a slash means match in all directories. For example,\n\"/foo\" matches file or directory \"foo\" anywhere, the same as pattern \"foo\".\n\"/foo/bar\" matches file or directory \"bar\" anywhere that is directly under\ndirectory \"foo\".\n\n•   A trailing \"/\" matches everything inside. For example, \"abc/\" matches all\nfiles inside directory \"abc\", relative to the location of the .gitignore file,\nwith infinite depth.\n\n•   A slash followed by two consecutive asterisks then a slash matches zero or more\ndirectories. For example, \"a//b\" matches \"a/b\", \"a/x/b\", \"a/x/y/b\" and so on.\n\n•   Other consecutive asterisks are considered invalid.\n\nGlob magic is incompatible with literal magic.\n\nattr\nAfter attr: comes a space separated list of \"attribute requirements\", all of which\nmust be met in order for the path to be considered a match; this is in addition to\nthe usual non-magic pathspec pattern matching. See gitattributes(5).\n\nEach of the attribute requirements for the path takes one of these forms:\n\n•   \"ATTR\" requires that the attribute ATTR be set.\n\n•   \"-ATTR\" requires that the attribute ATTR be unset.\n\n•   \"ATTR=VALUE\" requires that the attribute ATTR be set to the string VALUE.\n\n•   \"!ATTR\" requires that the attribute ATTR be unspecified.\n\nNote that when matching against a tree object, attributes are still obtained from\nworking tree, not from the given tree object.\n\nexclude\nAfter a path matches any non-exclude pathspec, it will be run through all exclude\npathspecs (magic signature: !  or its synonym ^). If it matches, the path is ignored.\nWhen there is no non-exclude pathspec, the exclusion is applied to the result set as\nif invoked without any pathspec.\n\nparent\nA commit object contains a (possibly empty) list of the logical predecessor(s) in the\nline of development, i.e. its parents.\n\npickaxe\nThe term pickaxe refers to an option to the diffcore routines that help select changes\nthat add or delete a given text string. With the --pickaxe-all option, it can be used to\nview the full changeset that introduced or removed, say, a particular line of text. See\ngit-diff(1).\n\nplumbing\nCute name for core Git.\n\nporcelain\nCute name for programs and program suites depending on core Git, presenting a high level\naccess to core Git. Porcelains expose more of a SCM interface than the plumbing.\n\nper-worktree ref\nRefs that are per-worktree, rather than global. This is presently only HEAD and any refs\nthat start with refs/bisect/, but might later include other unusual refs.\n\npseudoref\nPseudorefs are a class of files under $GITDIR which behave like refs for the purposes of\nrev-parse, but which are treated specially by git. Pseudorefs both have names that are\nall-caps, and always start with a line consisting of a SHA-1 followed by whitespace. So,\nHEAD is not a pseudoref, because it is sometimes a symbolic ref. They might optionally\ncontain some additional data.  MERGEHEAD and CHERRYPICKHEAD are examples. Unlike\nper-worktree refs, these files cannot be symbolic refs, and never have reflogs. They also\ncannot be updated through the normal ref update machinery. Instead, they are updated by\ndirectly writing to the files. However, they can be read as if they were refs, so git\nrev-parse MERGEHEAD will work.\n\npull\nPulling a branch means to fetch it and merge it. See also git-pull(1).\n\npush\nPushing a branch means to get the branch’s head ref from a remote repository, find out if\nit is an ancestor to the branch’s local head ref, and in that case, putting all objects,\nwhich are reachable from the local head ref, and which are missing from the remote\nrepository, into the remote object database, and updating the remote head ref. If the\nremote head is not an ancestor to the local head, the push fails.\n\nreachable\nAll of the ancestors of a given commit are said to be \"reachable\" from that commit. More\ngenerally, one object is reachable from another if we can reach the one from the other by\na chain that follows tags to whatever they tag, commits to their parents or trees, and\ntrees to the trees or blobs that they contain.\n\nrebase\nTo reapply a series of changes from a branch to a different base, and reset the head of\nthat branch to the result.\n\nref\nA name that begins with refs/ (e.g.  refs/heads/master) that points to an object name or\nanother ref (the latter is called a symbolic ref). For convenience, a ref can sometimes\nbe abbreviated when used as an argument to a Git command; see gitrevisions(7) for\ndetails. Refs are stored in the repository.\n\nThe ref namespace is hierarchical. Different subhierarchies are used for different\npurposes (e.g. the refs/heads/ hierarchy is used to represent local branches).\n\nThere are a few special-purpose refs that do not begin with refs/. The most notable\nexample is HEAD.\n\nreflog\nA reflog shows the local \"history\" of a ref. In other words, it can tell you what the 3rd\nlast revision in this repository was, and what was the current state in this repository,\nyesterday 9:14pm. See git-reflog(1) for details.\n\nrefspec\nA \"refspec\" is used by fetch and push to describe the mapping between remote ref and\nlocal ref.\n\nremote repository\nA repository which is used to track the same project but resides somewhere else. To\ncommunicate with remotes, see fetch or push.\n\nremote-tracking branch\nA ref that is used to follow changes from another repository. It typically looks like\nrefs/remotes/foo/bar (indicating that it tracks a branch named bar in a remote named\nfoo), and matches the right-hand-side of a configured fetch refspec. A remote-tracking\nbranch should not contain direct modifications or have local commits made to it.\n\nrepository\nA collection of refs together with an object database containing all objects which are\nreachable from the refs, possibly accompanied by meta data from one or more porcelains. A\nrepository can share an object database with other repositories via alternates mechanism.\n\nresolve\nThe action of fixing up manually what a failed automatic merge left behind.\n\nrevision\nSynonym for commit (the noun).\n\nrewind\nTo throw away part of the development, i.e. to assign the head to an earlier revision.\n\nSCM\nSource code management (tool).\n\nSHA-1\n\"Secure Hash Algorithm 1\"; a cryptographic hash function. In the context of Git used as a\nsynonym for object name.\n\nshallow clone\nMostly a synonym to shallow repository but the phrase makes it more explicit that it was\ncreated by running git clone --depth=...  command.\n\nshallow repository\nA shallow repository has an incomplete history some of whose commits have parents\ncauterized away (in other words, Git is told to pretend that these commits do not have\nthe parents, even though they are recorded in the commit object). This is sometimes\nuseful when you are interested only in the recent history of a project even though the\nreal history recorded in the upstream is much larger. A shallow repository is created by\ngiving the --depth option to git-clone(1), and its history can be later deepened with\ngit-fetch(1).\n\nstash entry\nAn object used to temporarily store the contents of a dirty working directory and the\nindex for future reuse.\n\nsubmodule\nA repository that holds the history of a separate project inside another repository (the\nlatter of which is called superproject).\n\nsuperproject\nA repository that references repositories of other projects in its working tree as\nsubmodules. The superproject knows about the names of (but does not hold copies of)\ncommit objects of the contained submodules.\n\nsymref\nSymbolic reference: instead of containing the SHA-1 id itself, it is of the format ref:\nrefs/some/thing and when referenced, it recursively dereferences to this reference.  HEAD\nis a prime example of a symref. Symbolic references are manipulated with the git-\nsymbolic-ref(1) command.\n\ntag\nA ref under refs/tags/ namespace that points to an object of an arbitrary type (typically\na tag points to either a tag or a commit object). In contrast to a head, a tag is not\nupdated by the commit command. A Git tag has nothing to do with a Lisp tag (which would\nbe called an object type in Git’s context). A tag is most typically used to mark a\nparticular point in the commit ancestry chain.\n\ntag object\nAn object containing a ref pointing to another object, which can contain a message just\nlike a commit object. It can also contain a (PGP) signature, in which case it is called a\n\"signed tag object\".\n\ntopic branch\nA regular Git branch that is used by a developer to identify a conceptual line of\ndevelopment. Since branches are very easy and inexpensive, it is often desirable to have\nseveral small branches that each contain very well defined concepts or small incremental\nyet related changes.\n\ntree\nEither a working tree, or a tree object together with the dependent blob and tree objects\n(i.e. a stored representation of a working tree).\n\ntree object\nAn object containing a list of file names and modes along with refs to the associated\nblob and/or tree objects. A tree is equivalent to a directory.\n\ntree-ish (also treeish)\nA tree object or an object that can be recursively dereferenced to a tree object.\nDereferencing a commit object yields the tree object corresponding to the revision's top\ndirectory. The following are all tree-ishes: a commit-ish, a tree object, a tag object\nthat points to a tree object, a tag object that points to a tag object that points to a\ntree object, etc.\n\nunmerged index\nAn index which contains unmerged index entries.\n\nunreachable object\nAn object which is not reachable from a branch, tag, or any other reference.\n\nupstream branch\nThe default branch that is merged into the branch in question (or the branch in question\nis rebased onto). It is configured via branch.<name>.remote and branch.<name>.merge. If\nthe upstream branch of A is origin/B sometimes we say \"A is tracking origin/B\".\n\nworking tree\nThe tree of actual checked out files. The working tree normally contains the contents of\nthe HEAD commit’s tree, plus any local changes that you have made but not yet committed.\n\n### SEE ALSO\n\ngittutorial(7), gittutorial-2(7), gitcvs-migration(7), giteveryday(7), The Git User’’s\nManual[1]\n\n### GIT\n\nPart of the git(1) suite\n\n### NOTES\n\n1. The Git User’s Manual\nfile:///usr/share/doc/git/html/user-manual.html\n\n\n\nGit 2.34.1                                   02/26/2026                               GITGLOSSARY(7)\n\n"
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