Re: --no-decorate and %d in git-log(1)

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Feb 25, 2026, 20:08 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqcy1sa8mx.fsf@gitster.g>
In-Reply-To: <8f6441ab-5c9a-4b42-ab2e-a670d462569d@xiplink.com>

Marc Branchaud <marcnarc@xiplink.com> writes:

Show 5 quoted lines

> BTW, --decorate=auto is documented as "if the output is going to a 
> terminal, the ref names are shown as if `short` were given, otherwise no 
> ref names are shown."  But in my experiments %d still shows refs even 
> when the output is piped to a file.  Seems like another symptom of the 
> same bug?

Isn't that documentation merely referring to "git log" without "--format=... %d ..." and not about the case where you explicitly ask for "%d"? That is, the description is there to explain the differences between

	git log --oneline --decorate=auto -1
	git log --oneline --decorate=auto -1 | cat

isn't it? I think --decorate=auto is the default so the above without --decorate=auto would behave similarly.

> (Do people who use `--format` (with or without %d) *also* use 
> `--decorate`?  It seems like the two are naturally exclusive, even if 
> the code allows them both.)

That is an interesting question, but I am not sure if it affects how we decide to resolve this discussion.