git-tag

GIT-TAG(1)                        Git Manual                        GIT-TAG(1)

NAME
       git-tag - Create, list, delete or verify a tag object signed with GPG

SYNOPSIS
       git tag [-a | -s | -u <keyid>] [-f] [-m <msg> | -F <file>] [-e]
               <tagname> [<commit> | <object>]
       git tag -d <tagname>...
       git tag [-n[<num>]] -l [--contains <commit>] [--no-contains <commit>]
               [--points-at <object>] [--column[=<options>] | --no-column]
               [--create-reflog] [--sort=<key>] [--format=<format>]
               [--[no-]merged [<commit>]] [<pattern>...]
       git tag -v [--format=<format>] <tagname>...

DESCRIPTION
       Add a tag reference in refs/tags/, unless -d/-l/-v is given to delete,
       list or verify tags.

       Unless -f is given, the named tag must not yet exist.

       If one of -a, -s, or -u <keyid> is passed, the command creates a tag
       object, and requires a tag message. Unless -m <msg> or -F <file> is
       given, an editor is started for the user to type in the tag message.

       If -m <msg> or -F <file> is given and -a, -s, and -u <keyid> are
       absent, -a is implied.

       Otherwise, a tag reference that points directly at the given object
       (i.e., a lightweight tag) is created.

       A GnuPG signed tag object will be created when -s or -u <keyid> is
       used. When -u <keyid> is not used, the committer identity for the
       current user is used to find the GnuPG key for signing. The
       configuration variable gpg.program is used to specify custom GnuPG
       binary.

       Tag objects (created with -a, -s, or -u) are called "annotated" tags;
       they contain a creation date, the tagger name and e-mail, a tagging
       message, and an optional GnuPG signature. Whereas a "lightweight" tag
       is simply a name for an object (usually a commit object).

       Annotated tags are meant for release while lightweight tags are meant
       for private or temporary object labels. For this reason, some git
       commands for naming objects (like git describe) will ignore lightweight
       tags by default.

OPTIONS
       -a, --annotate
           Make an unsigned, annotated tag object

       -s, --sign
           Make a GPG-signed tag, using the default e-mail address's key. The
           default behavior of tag GPG-signing is controlled by tag.gpgSign
           configuration variable if it exists, or disabled otherwise. See
           git-config(1).

       --no-sign
           Override tag.gpgSign configuration variable that is set to force
           each and every tag to be signed.

       -u <keyid>, --local-user=<keyid>
           Make a GPG-signed tag, using the given key.

       -f, --force
           Replace an existing tag with the given name (instead of failing)

       -d, --delete
           Delete existing tags with the given names.

       -v, --verify
           Verify the GPG signature of the given tag names.

       -n<num>
           <num> specifies how many lines from the annotation, if any, are
           printed when using -l. Implies --list.

           The default is not to print any annotation lines. If no number is
           given to -n, only the first line is printed. If the tag is not
           annotated, the commit message is displayed instead.

       -l, --list
           List tags. With optional <pattern>..., e.g.  git tag --list 'v-*',
           list only the tags that match the pattern(s).

           Running "git tag" without arguments also lists all tags. The
           pattern is a shell wildcard (i.e., matched using fnmatch(3)).
           Multiple patterns may be given; if any of them matches, the tag is
           shown.

           This option is implicitly supplied if any other list-like option
           such as --contains is provided. See the documentation for each of
           those options for details.

       --sort=<key>
           Sort based on the key given. Prefix - to sort in descending order
           of the value. You may use the --sort=<key> option multiple times,
           in which case the last key becomes the primary key. Also supports
           "version:refname" or "v:refname" (tag names are treated as
           versions). The "version:refname" sort order can also be affected by
           the "versionsort.suffix" configuration variable. The keys supported
           are the same as those in git for-each-ref. Sort order defaults to
           the value configured for the tag.sort variable if it exists, or
           lexicographic order otherwise. See git-config(1).

       --color[=<when>]
           Respect any colors specified in the --format option. The <when>
           field must be one of always, never, or auto (if <when> is absent,
           behave as if always was given).

       -i, --ignore-case
           Sorting and filtering tags are case insensitive.

       --column[=<options>], --no-column
           Display tag listing in columns. See configuration variable
           column.tag for option syntax.--column and --no-column without
           options are equivalent to always and never respectively.

           This option is only applicable when listing tags without annotation
           lines.

       --contains [<commit>]
           Only list tags which contain the specified commit (HEAD if not
           specified). Implies --list.

       --no-contains [<commit>]
           Only list tags which don't contain the specified commit (HEAD if
           not specified). Implies --list.

       --merged [<commit>]
           Only list tags whose commits are reachable from the specified
           commit (HEAD if not specified), incompatible with --no-merged.

       --no-merged [<commit>]
           Only list tags whose commits are not reachable from the specified
           commit (HEAD if not specified), incompatible with --merged.

       --points-at <object>
           Only list tags of the given object (HEAD if not specified). Implies
           --list.

       -m <msg>, --message=<msg>
           Use the given tag message (instead of prompting). If multiple -m
           options are given, their values are concatenated as separate
           paragraphs. Implies -a if none of -a, -s, or -u <keyid> is given.

       -F <file>, --file=<file>
           Take the tag message from the given file. Use - to read the message
           from the standard input. Implies -a if none of -a, -s, or -u
           <keyid> is given.

       -e, --edit
           The message taken from file with -F and command line with -m are
           usually used as the tag message unmodified. This option lets you
           further edit the message taken from these sources.

       --cleanup=<mode>
           This option sets how the tag message is cleaned up. The <mode> can
           be one of verbatim, whitespace and strip. The strip mode is
           default. The verbatim mode does not change message at all,
           whitespace removes just leading/trailing whitespace lines and strip
           removes both whitespace and commentary.

       --create-reflog
           Create a reflog for the tag. To globally enable reflogs for tags,
           see core.logAllRefUpdates in git-config(1). The negated form
           --no-create-reflog only overrides an earlier --create-reflog, but
           currently does not negate the setting of core.logAllRefUpdates.

       --format=<format>
           A string that interpolates %(fieldname) from a tag ref being shown
           and the object it points at. The format is the same as that of git-
           for-each-ref(1). When unspecified, defaults to %(refname:strip=2).

       <tagname>
           The name of the tag to create, delete, or describe. The new tag
           name must pass all checks defined by git-check-ref-format(1). Some
           of these checks may restrict the characters allowed in a tag name.

       <commit>, <object>
           The object that the new tag will refer to, usually a commit.
           Defaults to HEAD.

CONFIGURATION
       By default, git tag in sign-with-default mode (-s) will use your
       committer identity (of the form Your Name <your@email.address>) to find
       a key. If you want to use a different default key, you can specify it
       in the repository configuration as follows:

           [user]
               signingKey = <gpg-keyid>

       pager.tag is only respected when listing tags, i.e., when -l is used or
       implied. The default is to use a pager. See git-config(1).

DISCUSSION
   On Re-tagging
       What should you do when you tag a wrong commit and you would want to
       re-tag?

       If you never pushed anything out, just re-tag it. Use "-f" to replace
       the old one. And you're done.

       But if you have pushed things out (or others could just read your
       repository directly), then others will have already seen the old tag.
       In that case you can do one of two things:

        1. The sane thing. Just admit you screwed up, and use a different
           name. Others have already seen one tag-name, and if you keep the
           same name, you may be in the situation that two people both have
           "version X", but they actually have different "X"'s. So just call
           it "X.1" and be done with it.

        2. The insane thing. You really want to call the new version "X" too,
           even though others have already seen the old one. So just use git
           tag -f again, as if you hadn't already published the old one.

       However, Git does not (and it should not) change tags behind users
       back. So if somebody already got the old tag, doing a git pull on your
       tree shouldn't just make them overwrite the old one.

       If somebody got a release tag from you, you cannot just change the tag
       for them by updating your own one. This is a big security issue, in
       that people MUST be able to trust their tag-names. If you really want
       to do the insane thing, you need to just fess up to it, and tell people
       that you messed up. You can do that by making a very public
       announcement saying:

           Ok, I messed up, and I pushed out an earlier version tagged as X. I
           then fixed something, and retagged the *fixed* tree as X again.

           If you got the wrong tag, and want the new one, please delete
           the old one and fetch the new one by doing:

                   git tag -d X
                   git fetch origin tag X

           to get my updated tag.

           You can test which tag you have by doing

                   git rev-parse X

           which should return 0123456789abcdef.. if you have the new version.

           Sorry for the inconvenience.

       Does this seem a bit complicated? It should be. There is no way that it
       would be correct to just "fix" it automatically. People need to know
       that their tags might have been changed.

   On Automatic following
       If you are following somebody else's tree, you are most likely using
       remote-tracking branches (eg. refs/remotes/origin/master). You usually
       want the tags from the other end.

       On the other hand, if you are fetching because you would want a
       one-shot merge from somebody else, you typically do not want to get
       tags from there. This happens more often for people near the toplevel
       but not limited to them. Mere mortals when pulling from each other do
       not necessarily want to automatically get private anchor point tags
       from the other person.

       Often, "please pull" messages on the mailing list just provide two
       pieces of information: a repo URL and a branch name; this is designed
       to be easily cut&pasted at the end of a git fetch command line:

           Linus, please pull from

                   git://git..../proj.git master

           to get the following updates...

       becomes:

           $ git pull git://git..../proj.git master

       In such a case, you do not want to automatically follow the other
       person's tags.

       One important aspect of Git is its distributed nature, which largely
       means there is no inherent "upstream" or "downstream" in the system. On
       the face of it, the above example might seem to indicate that the tag
       namespace is owned by the upper echelon of people and that tags only
       flow downwards, but that is not the case. It only shows that the usage
       pattern determines who are interested in whose tags.

       A one-shot pull is a sign that a commit history is now crossing the
       boundary between one circle of people (e.g. "people who are primarily
       interested in the networking part of the kernel") who may have their
       own set of tags (e.g. "this is the third release candidate from the
       networking group to be proposed for general consumption with 2.6.21
       release") to another circle of people (e.g. "people who integrate
       various subsystem improvements"). The latter are usually not interested
       in the detailed tags used internally in the former group (that is what
       "internal" means). That is why it is desirable not to follow tags
       automatically in this case.

       It may well be that among networking people, they may want to exchange
       the tags internal to their group, but in that workflow they are most
       likely tracking each other's progress by having remote-tracking
       branches. Again, the heuristic to automatically follow such tags is a
       good thing.

   On Backdating Tags
       If you have imported some changes from another VCS and would like to
       add tags for major releases of your work, it is useful to be able to
       specify the date to embed inside of the tag object; such data in the
       tag object affects, for example, the ordering of tags in the gitweb
       interface.

       To set the date used in future tag objects, set the environment
       variable GIT_COMMITTER_DATE (see the later discussion of possible
       values; the most common form is "YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM").

       For example:

           $ GIT_COMMITTER_DATE="2006-10-02 10:31" git tag -s v1.0.1

DATE FORMATS
       The GIT_AUTHOR_DATE, GIT_COMMITTER_DATE environment variables support
       the following date formats:

       Git internal format
           It is <unix timestamp> <time zone offset>, where <unix timestamp>
           is the number of seconds since the UNIX epoch.  <time zone offset>
           is a positive or negative offset from UTC. For example CET (which
           is 1 hour ahead of UTC) is +0100.

       RFC 2822
           The standard email format as described by RFC 2822, for example
           Thu, 07 Apr 2005 22:13:13 +0200.

       ISO 8601
           Time and date specified by the ISO 8601 standard, for example
           2005-04-07T22:13:13. The parser accepts a space instead of the T
           character as well.

               Note
               In addition, the date part is accepted in the following
               formats: YYYY.MM.DD, MM/DD/YYYY and DD.MM.YYYY.

SEE ALSO
       git-check-ref-format(1). git-config(1).

GIT
       Part of the git(1) suite

Git 2.25.1                        04/26/2023                        GIT-TAG(1)