GIT commit as different user without email / or only email
I'm trying to commit some changes as a different user, but i do not have a valid email address, following command is not working for me:
git commit --author="john doe" -m "some fix"
fatal: No existing author found with 'john doe'
I have the same problem when trying to commit with only an email address
git commit --author="[email protected]" -m "some fix"
fatal: No existing author found with '[email protected]'
On the GIT man pages for the commit command it says i can use the
standard A U Thor <[email protected]> format
For the --author option.
Where is this format defined ? what does A and U stand for ? how do i commit for a different user with only a username or only an email?
Answer
The minimal required author format, as hinted to in this SO answer, is
Name <email>
In your case, this means you want to write
git commit --author="Name <email>" -m "whatever"
Per Willem D'Haeseleer's comment, if you don't have an email address, you can use <>:
git commit --author="Name <>" -m "whatever"
As written on the git commit man page that you linked to, if you supply anything less than that, it's used as a search token to search through previous commits, looking for other commits by that author.