log
===
:Purpose: Show historical log for a branch or subset of a branch.
:Usage: bzr log [FILE...]
:Options:
--signatures Show digital signature validity.
-v, --verbose Show files changed in each revision.
--include-merged Show merged revisions like --levels 0 does.
--timezone=ARG Display timezone as local, original, or utc.
-h, --help Show help message.
-p, --show-diff Show changes made in each revision as a patch.
--forward Show from oldest to newest.
-m ARG, --match=ARG Show revisions whose properties match this expression.
-r ARG, --revision=ARG
See "help revisionspec" for details.
--omit-merges Do not report commits with more than one parent.
--usage Show usage message and options.
-n N, --levels=N Number of levels to display - 0 for all, 1 for flat.
--authors=ARG What names to list as authors - first, all or
committer.
--match-author=ARG Show revisions whose authors match this expression.
--match-message=ARG Show revisions whose message matches this expression.
-c ARG, --change=ARG Show just the specified revision. See also "help
revisionspec".
--match-bugs=ARG Show revisions whose bugs match this expression.
-q, --quiet Only display errors and warnings.
--match-committer=ARG
Show revisions whose committer matches this
expression.
-l N, --limit=N Limit the output to the first N revisions.
--show-ids Show internal object ids.
--exclude-common-ancestry
Display only the revisions that are not part of both
ancestries (require -rX..Y).
Log format:
--log-format=ARG Use specified log format.
--gnu-changelog Format used by GNU ChangeLog files.
--line Log format with one line per revision.
--long Detailed log format.
-S, --short Moderately short log format.
:Description:
log is bzr's default tool for exploring the history of a branch.
The branch to use is taken from the first parameter. If no parameters
are given, the branch containing the working directory is logged.
Here are some simple examples::
bzr log log the current branch
bzr log foo.py log a file in its branch
bzr log http://server/branch log a branch on a server
The filtering, ordering and information shown for each revision can
be controlled as explained below. By default, all revisions are
shown sorted (topologically) so that newer revisions appear before
older ones and descendants always appear before ancestors. If displayed,
merged revisions are shown indented under the revision in which they
were merged.
:Output control:
The log format controls how information about each revision is
displayed. The standard log formats are called ``long``, ``short``
and ``line``. The default is long. See ``bzr help log-formats``
for more details on log formats.
The following options can be used to control what information is
displayed::
-l N display a maximum of N revisions
-n N display N levels of revisions (0 for all, 1 for collapsed)
-v display a status summary (delta) for each revision
-p display a diff (patch) for each revision
--show-ids display revision-ids (and file-ids), not just revnos
Note that the default number of levels to display is a function of the
log format. If the -n option is not used, the standard log formats show
just the top level (mainline).
Status summaries are shown using status flags like A, M, etc. To see
the changes explained using words like ``added`` and ``modified``
instead, use the -vv option.
:Ordering control:
To display revisions from oldest to newest, use the --forward option.
In most cases, using this option will have little impact on the total
time taken to produce a log, though --forward does not incrementally
display revisions like --reverse does when it can.
:Revision filtering:
The -r option can be used to specify what revision or range of revisions
to filter against. The various forms are shown below::
-rX display revision X
-rX.. display revision X and later
-r..Y display up to and including revision Y
-rX..Y display from X to Y inclusive
See ``bzr help revisionspec`` for details on how to specify X and Y.
Some common examples are given below::
-r-1 show just the tip
-r-10.. show the last 10 mainline revisions
-rsubmit:.. show what's new on this branch
-rancestor:path.. show changes since the common ancestor of this
branch and the one at location path
-rdate:yesterday.. show changes since yesterday
When logging a range of revisions using -rX..Y, log starts at
revision Y and searches back in history through the primary
("left-hand") parents until it finds X. When logging just the
top level (using -n1), an error is reported if X is not found
along the way. If multi-level logging is used (-n0), X may be
a nested merge revision and the log will be truncated accordingly.
:Path filtering:
If parameters are given and the first one is not a branch, the log
will be filtered to show only those revisions that changed the
nominated files or directories.
Filenames are interpreted within their historical context. To log a
deleted file, specify a revision range so that the file existed at
the end or start of the range.
Historical context is also important when interpreting pathnames of
renamed files/directories. Consider the following example:
* revision 1: add tutorial.txt
* revision 2: modify tutorial.txt
* revision 3: rename tutorial.txt to guide.txt; add tutorial.txt
In this case:
* ``bzr log guide.txt`` will log the file added in revision 1
* ``bzr log tutorial.txt`` will log the new file added in revision 3
* ``bzr log -r2 -p tutorial.txt`` will show the changes made to
the original file in revision 2.
* ``bzr log -r2 -p guide.txt`` will display an error message as there
was no file called guide.txt in revision 2.
Renames are always followed by log. By design, there is no need to
explicitly ask for this (and no way to stop logging a file back
until it was last renamed).
:Other filtering:
The --match option can be used for finding revisions that match a
regular expression in a commit message, committer, author or bug.
Specifying the option several times will match any of the supplied
expressions. --match-author, --match-bugs, --match-committer and
--match-message can be used to only match a specific field.
:Tips & tricks:
GUI tools and IDEs are often better at exploring history than command
line tools: you may prefer qlog or viz from qbzr or bzr-gtk, the
bzr-explorer shell, or the Loggerhead web interface. See the Plugin
Guide <http://doc.bazaar.canonical.com/plugins/en/> and
<http://wiki.bazaar.canonical.com/IDEIntegration>.
You may find it useful to add the aliases below to ``bazaar.conf``::
[ALIASES]
tip = log -r-1
top = log -l10 --line
show = log -v -p
``bzr tip`` will then show the latest revision while ``bzr top``
will show the last 10 mainline revisions. To see the details of a
particular revision X, ``bzr show -rX``.
If you are interested in looking deeper into a particular merge X,
use ``bzr log -n0 -rX``.
``bzr log -v`` on a branch with lots of history is currently
very slow. A fix for this issue is currently under development.
With or without that fix, it is recommended that a revision range
be given when using the -v option.
bzr has a generic full-text matching plugin, bzr-search, that can be
used to find revisions matching user names, commit messages, etc.
Among other features, this plugin can find all revisions containing
a list of words but not others.
When exploring non-mainline history on large projects with deep
history, the performance of log can be greatly improved by installing
the historycache plugin. This plugin buffers historical information
trading disk space for faster speed.
:See also: :doc:`log-formats <log-formats-help>`, :doc:`revisionspec <revisionspec-help>`
