git-update-ref - Update the object name stored in a ref safely

Given two arguments, stores the <newvalue> in the <ref>, possibly dereferencing the symbolic refs. E.g. git update-ref HEAD <newvalue> updates the current branch head to the new object.

Given three arguments, stores the <newvalue> in the <ref>, possibly dereferencing the symbolic refs, after verifying that the current value of the <ref> matches <oldvalue>. E.g. git update-ref refs/heads/master <newvalue> <oldvalue> updates the master branch head to <newvalue> only if its current value is <oldvalue>. You can specify 40 "0" or an empty string as <oldvalue> to make sure that the ref you are creating does not exist.

It also allows a "ref" file to be a symbolic pointer to another ref file by starting with the four-byte header sequence of "ref:".

More importantly, it allows the update of a ref file to follow these symbolic pointers, whether they are symlinks or these "regular file symbolic refs". It follows real symlinks only if they start with "refs/": otherwise it will just try to read them and update them as a regular file (i.e. it will allow the filesystem to follow them, but will overwrite such a symlink to somewhere else with a regular filename).

If --no-deref is given, <ref> itself is overwritten, rather than the result of following the symbolic pointers.

In general, using

git update-ref HEAD "$head"

should be a lot safer than doing

echo "$head" > "$GIT_DIR/HEAD"

both from a symlink following standpoint and an error checking standpoint. The "refs/" rule for symlinks means that symlinks that point to "outside" the tree are safe: they’ll be followed for reading but not for writing (so we’ll never write through a ref symlink to some other tree, if you have copied a whole archive by creating a symlink tree).

With -d flag, it deletes the named <ref> after verifying it still contains <oldvalue>.

With --stdin, update-ref reads instructions from standard input and performs all modifications together. Specify commands of the form:

update SP <ref> SP <newvalue> [SP <oldvalue>] LF
create SP <ref> SP <newvalue> LF
delete SP <ref> [SP <oldvalue>] LF
verify SP <ref> [SP <oldvalue>] LF
option SP <opt> LF
start LF
prepare LF
commit LF
abort LF

With --create-reflog, update-ref will create a reflog for each ref even if one would not ordinarily be created.

Quote fields containing whitespace as if they were strings in C source code; i.e., surrounded by double-quotes and with backslash escapes. Use 40 "0" characters or the empty string to specify a zero value. To specify a missing value, omit the value and its preceding SP entirely.

Alternatively, use -z to specify in NUL-terminated format, without quoting:

update SP <ref> NUL <newvalue> NUL [<oldvalue>] NUL
create SP <ref> NUL <newvalue> NUL
delete SP <ref> NUL [<oldvalue>] NUL
verify SP <ref> NUL [<oldvalue>] NUL
option SP <opt> NUL
start NUL
prepare NUL
commit NUL
abort NUL

In this format, use 40 "0" to specify a zero value, and use the empty string to specify a missing value.

In either format, values can be specified in any form that Git recognizes as an object name. Commands in any other format or a repeated <ref> produce an error. Command meanings are:

If all <ref>s can be locked with matching <oldvalue>s simultaneously, all modifications are performed. Otherwise, no modifications are performed. Note that while each individual <ref> is updated or deleted atomically, a concurrent reader may still see a subset of the modifications.

If config parameter "core.logAllRefUpdates" is true and the ref is one under "refs/heads/", "refs/remotes/", "refs/notes/", or a pseudoref like HEAD or ORIG_HEAD; or the file "$GIT_DIR/logs/<ref>" exists then git update-ref will append a line to the log file "$GIT_DIR/logs/<ref>" (dereferencing all symbolic refs before creating the log name) describing the change in ref value. Log lines are formatted as:

oldsha1 SP newsha1 SP committer LF

Where "oldsha1" is the 40 character hexadecimal value previously stored in <ref>, "newsha1" is the 40 character hexadecimal value of <newvalue> and "committer" is the committer’s name, email address and date in the standard Git committer ident format.

Optionally with -m:

oldsha1 SP newsha1 SP committer TAB message LF

Where all fields are as described above and "message" is the value supplied to the -m option.

An update will fail (without changing <ref>) if the current user is unable to create a new log file, append to the existing log file or does not have committer information available.