6 git-fetch - Download objects and refs from another repository
12 'git fetch' [<options>] [<repository> [<refspec>...]]
13 'git fetch' [<options>] <group>
14 'git fetch' --multiple [<options>] [(<repository> | <group>)...]
15 'git fetch' --all [<options>]
20 Fetch branches and/or tags (collectively, "refs") from one or more
21 other repositories, along with the objects necessary to complete their
22 histories. Remote-tracking branches are updated (see the description
23 of <refspec> below for ways to control this behavior).
25 By default, any tag that points into the histories being fetched is
26 also fetched; the effect is to fetch tags that
27 point at branches that you are interested in. This default behavior
28 can be changed by using the --tags or --no-tags options or by
29 configuring remote.<name>.tagOpt. By using a refspec that fetches tags
30 explicitly, you can fetch tags that do not point into branches you
31 are interested in as well.
33 'git fetch' can fetch from either a single named repository or URL,
34 or from several repositories at once if <group> is given and
35 there is a remotes.<group> entry in the configuration file.
36 (See linkgit:git-config[1]).
38 When no remote is specified, by default the `origin` remote will be used,
39 unless there's an upstream branch configured for the current branch. This can
40 be configured with `fetch.default`.
42 The names of refs that are fetched, together with the object names
43 they point at, are written to `.git/FETCH_HEAD`. This information
44 may be used by scripts or other git commands, such as linkgit:git-pull[1].
48 include::fetch-options.txt[]
50 include::pull-fetch-param.txt[]
52 include::urls-remotes.txt[]
55 CONFIGURED REMOTE-TRACKING BRANCHES[[CRTB]]
56 -------------------------------------------
58 You often interact with the same remote repository by
59 regularly and repeatedly fetching from it. In order to keep track
60 of the progress of such a remote repository, `git fetch` allows you
61 to configure `remote.<repository>.fetch` configuration variables.
63 Typically such a variable may look like this:
65 ------------------------------------------------
67 fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
68 ------------------------------------------------
70 This configuration is used in two ways:
72 * When `git fetch` is run without specifying what branches
73 and/or tags to fetch on the command line, e.g. `git fetch origin`
74 or `git fetch`, `remote.<repository>.fetch` values are used as
75 the refspecs--they specify which refs to fetch and which local refs
76 to update. The example above will fetch
77 all branches that exist in the `origin` (i.e. any ref that matches
78 the left-hand side of the value, `refs/heads/*`) and update the
79 corresponding remote-tracking branches in the `refs/remotes/origin/*`
82 * When `git fetch` is run with explicit branches and/or tags
83 to fetch on the command line, e.g. `git fetch origin master`, the
84 <refspec>s given on the command line determine what are to be
85 fetched (e.g. `master` in the example,
86 which is a short-hand for `master:`, which in turn means
87 "fetch the 'master' branch but I do not explicitly say what
88 remote-tracking branch to update with it from the command line"),
89 and the example command will
90 fetch _only_ the 'master' branch. The `remote.<repository>.fetch`
91 values determine which
92 remote-tracking branch, if any, is updated. When used in this
93 way, the `remote.<repository>.fetch` values do not have any
94 effect in deciding _what_ gets fetched (i.e. the values are not
95 used as refspecs when the command-line lists refspecs); they are
96 only used to decide _where_ the refs that are fetched are stored
97 by acting as a mapping.
99 The latter use of the `remote.<repository>.fetch` values can be
100 overridden by giving the `--refmap=<refspec>` parameter(s) on the
107 * Update the remote-tracking branches:
109 ------------------------------------------------
111 ------------------------------------------------
113 The above command copies all branches from the remote refs/heads/
114 namespace and stores them to the local refs/remotes/origin/ namespace,
115 unless the branch.<name>.fetch option is used to specify a non-default
118 * Using refspecs explicitly:
120 ------------------------------------------------
121 $ git fetch origin +pu:pu maint:tmp
122 ------------------------------------------------
124 This updates (or creates, as necessary) branches `pu` and `tmp` in
125 the local repository by fetching from the branches (respectively)
126 `pu` and `maint` from the remote repository.
128 The `pu` branch will be updated even if it is does not fast-forward,
129 because it is prefixed with a plus sign; `tmp` will not be.
131 * Peek at a remote's branch, without configuring the remote in your local
134 ------------------------------------------------
135 $ git fetch git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/git/git.git maint
137 ------------------------------------------------
139 The first command fetches the `maint` branch from the repository at
140 `git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/git/git.git` and the second command uses
141 `FETCH_HEAD` to examine the branch with linkgit:git-log[1]. The fetched
142 objects will eventually be removed by git's built-in housekeeping (see
147 Using --recurse-submodules can only fetch new commits in already checked
148 out submodules right now. When e.g. upstream added a new submodule in the
149 just fetched commits of the superproject the submodule itself can not be
150 fetched, making it impossible to check out that submodule later without
151 having to do a fetch again. This is expected to be fixed in a future Git
160 Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite