Git alias with positional parameters

git command parameters position alias

user400575 · Jul 23, 2010 · Viewed 61.8k times · Source

Basically I'm trying to alias:

git files 9fa3

...to execute the command:

git diff --name-status 9fa3^ 9fa3

but git doesn't appear to pass positional parameters to the alias command. I have tried:

[alias]
    files = "!git diff --name-status $1^ $1"
    files = "!git diff --name-status {1}^ {1}"

...and a few others but those didn't work.

The degenerate case would be:

$ git echo_reverse_these_params a b c d e
e d c b a

...how can I make this work?

Answer

The most obvious way is to use a shell function:

[alias]
    files = "!f() { git diff --name-status \"$1^\" \"$1\"; }; f"

An alias without ! is treated as a Git command; e.g. commit-all = commit -a.

With the !, it's run as its own command in the shell, letting you use stronger magic like this.

UPD
Because commands are executed at the root of repository you may use ${GIT_PREFIX} variable when referring to the file names in commands