SYNOPSIS

git-ls-files [-z] [-t] (--[cached|deleted|others|ignored|stage|unmerged|killed])* (-[c|d|o|i|s|u|k])* [-x <pattern>|--exclude=<pattern>] [-X <file>|--exclude-from=<file>] [--exclude-per-directory=<file>]

DESCRIPTION

This merges the file listing in the directory cache index with the actual working directory list, and shows different combinations of the two.

One or more of the options below may be used to determine the files shown:

OPTIONS

-c|--cached

Show cached files in the output (default)

-d|--deleted

Show deleted files in the output

-o|--others

Show other files in the output

-i|--ignored

Show ignored files in the output Note the this also reverses any exclude list present.

-s|--stage

Show stage files in the output

-u|--unmerged

Show unmerged files in the output (forces --stage)

-k|--killed

Show files on the filesystem that need to be removed due to file/directory conflicts for checkout-cache to succeed.

-z

\0 line termination on output

-x|--exclude=<pattern>

Skips files matching pattern. Note that pattern is a shell wildcard pattern.

-X|--exclude-from=<file>

exclude patterns are read from <file>; 1 per line.

--exclude-per-directory=<file>

read additional exclude patterns that apply only to the directory and its subdirectories in <file>.

-t

Identify the file status with the following tags (followed by a space) at the start of each line: H cached M unmerged R removed/deleted K to be killed ? other

Output

show files just outputs the filename unless --stage is specified in which case it outputs:

[<tag> ]<mode> <object> <stage> <file>

"git-ls-files --unmerged" and "git-ls-files --stage" can be used to examine detailed information on unmerged paths.

For an unmerged path, instead of recording a single mode/SHA1 pair, the dircache records up to three such pairs; one from tree O in stage 1, A in stage 2, and B in stage 3. This information can be used by the user (or the porcelain) to see what should eventually be recorded at the path. (see read-cache for more information on state)

Exclude Patterns

git-ls-files can use a list of "exclude patterns" when traversing the directory tree and finding files to show when the flags --others or --ignored are specified.

These exclude patterns come from these places:

(1) command line flag --exclude=<pattern> specifies a single
    pattern.
(2) command line flag --exclude-from=<file> specifies a list of
    patterns stored in a file.
(3) command line flag --exclude-per-directory=<name> specifies
    a name of the file in each directory 'git-ls-files'
    examines, and if exists, its contents are used as an
    additional list of patterns.

An exclude pattern file used by (2) and (3) contains one pattern per line. A line that starts with a # can be used as comment for readability.

There are three lists of patterns that are in effect at a given time. They are built and ordered in the following way:

Each pattern in the pattern list specifies "a match pattern" and optionally the fate; either a file that matches the pattern is considered excluded or included. A filename is matched against the patterns in the three lists; the --exclude-from list is checked first, then the --exclude-per-directory list, and then finally the --exclude list. The last match determines its fate. If there is no match in the three lists, the fate is "included".

A pattern specified on the command line with --exclude or read from the file specified with --exclude-from is relative to the top of the directory tree. A pattern read from a file specified by --exclude-per-directory is relative to the directory that the pattern file appears in.

An exclude pattern is of the following format:

An example:

$ cat .git/ignore
# ignore objects and archives, anywhere in the tree.
*.[oa]
$ cat Documentation/.gitignore
# ignore generated html files,
*.html
# except foo.html which is maintained by hand
!foo.html
$ git-ls-files --ignored         --exclude='Documentation/*.[0-9]'         --exclude-from=.git/ignore         --exclude-per-directory=.gitignore

See Also

read-cache

Author

Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>

Documentation

Documentation by David Greaves, Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org>.

GIT

Part of the git suite