# git-gui blame: show previous commit

4 messages from 2007-07-29 to 2007-07-30. Participants: Florian Weimer, Johannes Schindelin, Jakub Narebski, Shawn O. Pearce.
Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/9286

## Florian Weimer, 2007-07-29 09:26

Subject: git-gui blame: show previous commit
Message-ID: <87myxfzhk6.fsf@mid.deneb.enyo.de>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/87myxfzhk6.fsf%40mid.deneb.enyo.de

```
How can I view the previous commit touching a specific line, so that I
can see what was there before?  For instance, the change could be
whitespace-only, so that I want to dig deeper.

```

## Johannes Schindelin, 2007-07-29 11:40

Subject: Re: git-gui blame: show previous commit
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0707291238230.14781@racer.site>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/Pine.LNX.4.64.0707291238230.14781%40racer.site
In-Reply-To: <87myxfzhk6.fsf@mid.deneb.enyo.de>

```
Hi,

On Sun, 29 Jul 2007, Florian Weimer wrote:

> How can I view the previous commit touching a specific line, so that I
> can see what was there before?  For instance, the change could be
> whitespace-only, so that I want to dig deeper.

If you want to ignore whitespace changes, try the option "-w" to "git 
blame".  I have no idea if "git-gui blame" can use that option, but it 
should not be hard for you to find out, and provide a patch if it does 
not yet.

Hth,
Dscho

```

## Jakub Narebski, 2007-07-29 22:53

Subject: Re: git-gui blame: show previous commit
Message-ID: <f8j5oa$mmo$1@sea.gmane.org>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/f8j5oa%24mmo%241%40sea.gmane.org
In-Reply-To: <87myxfzhk6.fsf@mid.deneb.enyo.de>

```
Florian Weimer wrote:

> How can I view the previous commit touching a specific line, so that I
> can see what was there before?  For instance, the change could be
> whitespace-only, so that I want to dig deeper.

You can always use "git blame -L<lineno>,+1 <revision> -- <file>". Or use
pickaxe search, i.e. "git log -S'<fragment>' <revision> -- <file>".

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Warsaw, Poland
ShadeHawk on #git

```

## Shawn O. Pearce, 2007-07-30 03:43

Subject: Re: git-gui blame: show previous commit
Message-ID: <20070730034314.GQ20052@spearce.org>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/20070730034314.GQ20052%40spearce.org
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0707291238230.14781@racer.site>

```
Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> wrote:
> On Sun, 29 Jul 2007, Florian Weimer wrote:
> 
> > How can I view the previous commit touching a specific line, so that I
> > can see what was there before?  For instance, the change could be
> > whitespace-only, so that I want to dig deeper.
> 
> If you want to ignore whitespace changes, try the option "-w" to "git 
> blame".  I have no idea if "git-gui blame" can use that option, but it 
> should not be hard for you to find out, and provide a patch if it does 
> not yet.

gitgui-0.7.4-35-ga840566 is a change from Junio to enable the
-w flag to git-blame if the underlying git is 1.5.3 or later.
So you'd need a pretty recent git-gui and a 1.5.3-rc0 or later
git binary underneath of it to get -w enabled in blame.  But it is
there for the original line annotation pass (the second blame pass
but first column displayed).

I keep meaning to add a "Show parent commit" in the context menu
of the blame viewer, but I haven't gotten around to it yet.
It has been requested a few times, just hasn't been done yet.
Maybe someone who wants it will submit a patch.  ;-)

In really recent git-gui (gitgui-0.7.5-76-g8e891fa and later) you
can browse any revision you want, so you could copy the commit SHA-1
from the lower pane and paste it in as "$sha1^" into the revision
expression field of the browse dialog, navigate to the file and
open the blame viewer.  That is really annoying, and doesn't jump
you to the correct lines automatically.  But it is possible to view
the parent.

-- 
Shawn.

```
