6 gitweb - Git web interface (web frontend to Git repositories)
10 To get started with gitweb, run linkgit:git-instaweb[1] from a Git repository.
11 This would configure and start your web server, and run web browser pointing to
17 Gitweb provides a web interface to Git repositories. Its features include:
19 * Viewing multiple Git repositories with common root.
20 * Browsing every revision of the repository.
21 * Viewing the contents of files in the repository at any revision.
22 * Viewing the revision log of branches, history of files and directories,
23 see what was changed when, by who.
24 * Viewing the blame/annotation details of any file (if enabled).
25 * Generating RSS and Atom feeds of commits, for any branch.
26 The feeds are auto-discoverable in modern web browsers.
27 * Viewing everything that was changed in a revision, and step through
28 revisions one at a time, viewing the history of the repository.
29 * Finding commits which commit messages matches given search term.
31 See http://git.kernel.org/?p=git/git.git;a=tree;f=gitweb[] or
32 http://repo.or.cz/w/git.git/tree/HEAD:/gitweb/[] for gitweb source code,
33 browsed using gitweb itself.
38 Various aspects of gitweb's behavior can be controlled through the configuration
39 file 'gitweb_config.perl' or '/etc/gitweb.conf'. See the linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]
44 Gitweb can show information from one or more Git repositories. These
45 repositories have to be all on local filesystem, and have to share common
46 repository root, i.e. be all under a single parent repository (but see also
47 "Advanced web server setup" section, "Webserver configuration with multiple
48 projects' root" subsection).
50 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
51 our $projectroot = '/path/to/parent/directory';
52 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
54 The default value for `$projectroot` is '/pub/git'. You can change it during
55 building gitweb via `GITWEB_PROJECTROOT` build configuration variable.
57 By default all Git repositories under `$projectroot` are visible and available
58 to gitweb. The list of projects is generated by default by scanning the
59 `$projectroot` directory for Git repositories (for object databases to be
60 more exact; gitweb is not interested in a working area, and is best suited
61 to showing "bare" repositories).
63 The name of the repository in gitweb is the path to its `$GIT_DIR` (its object
64 database) relative to `$projectroot`. Therefore the repository $repo can be
65 found at "$projectroot/$repo".
68 Projects list file format
69 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
70 Instead of having gitweb find repositories by scanning filesystem
71 starting from $projectroot, you can provide a pre-generated list of
72 visible projects by setting `$projects_list` to point to a plain text
73 file with a list of projects (with some additional info).
75 This file uses the following format:
77 * One record (for project / repository) per line; does not support line
78 continuation (newline escaping).
80 * Leading and trailing whitespace are ignored.
82 * Whitespace separated fields; any run of whitespace can be used as field
83 separator (rules for Perl's "`split(" ", $line)`").
85 * Fields use modified URI encoding, defined in RFC 3986, section 2.1
86 (Percent-Encoding), or rather "Query string encoding" (see
87 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Query_string#URL_encoding[]), the difference
88 being that SP (" ") can be encoded as "{plus}" (and therefore "{plus}" has to be
89 also percent-encoded).
91 Reserved characters are: "%" (used for encoding), "{plus}" (can be used to
92 encode SPACE), all whitespace characters as defined in Perl, including SP,
93 TAB and LF, (used to separate fields in a record).
95 * Currently recognized fields are:
97 path to repository GIT_DIR, relative to `$projectroot`
99 displayed as repository owner, preferably full name, or email,
102 You can generate the projects list index file using the project_index action
103 (the 'TXT' link on projects list page) directly from gitweb; see also
104 "Generating projects list using gitweb" section below.
107 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
108 foo.git Joe+R+Hacker+<joe@example.com>
109 foo/bar.git O+W+Ner+<owner@example.org>
110 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
113 By default this file controls only which projects are *visible* on projects
114 list page (note that entries that do not point to correctly recognized Git
115 repositories won't be displayed by gitweb). Even if a project is not
116 visible on projects list page, you can view it nevertheless by hand-crafting
117 a gitweb URL. By setting `$strict_export` configuration variable (see
118 linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]) to true value you can allow viewing only of
119 repositories also shown on the overview page (i.e. only projects explicitly
120 listed in projects list file will be accessible).
123 Generating projects list using gitweb
124 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
126 We assume that GITWEB_CONFIG has its default Makefile value, namely
127 'gitweb_config.perl'. Put the following in 'gitweb_make_index.perl' file:
128 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
129 read_config_file("gitweb_config.perl");
130 $projects_list = $projectroot;
131 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
133 Then create the following script to get list of project in the format
134 suitable for GITWEB_LIST build configuration variable (or
135 `$projects_list` variable in gitweb config):
137 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
140 export GITWEB_CONFIG="gitweb_make_index.perl"
141 export GATEWAY_INTERFACE="CGI/1.1"
142 export HTTP_ACCEPT="*/*"
143 export REQUEST_METHOD="GET"
144 export QUERY_STRING="a=project_index"
146 perl -- /var/www/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi
147 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
149 Run this script and save its output to a file. This file could then be used
150 as projects list file, which means that you can set `$projects_list` to its
154 Controlling access to Git repositories
155 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
156 By default all Git repositories under `$projectroot` are visible and
157 available to gitweb. You can however configure how gitweb controls access
160 * As described in "Projects list file format" section, you can control which
161 projects are *visible* by selectively including repositories in projects
162 list file, and setting `$projects_list` gitweb configuration variable to
163 point to it. With `$strict_export` set, projects list file can be used to
164 control which repositories are *available* as well.
166 * You can configure gitweb to only list and allow viewing of the explicitly
167 exported repositories, via `$export_ok` variable in gitweb config file; see
168 linkgit:gitweb.conf[5] manpage. If it evaluates to true, gitweb shows
169 repositories only if this file named by `$export_ok` exists in its object
170 database (if directory has the magic file named `$export_ok`).
172 For example linkgit:git-daemon[1] by default (unless `--export-all` option
173 is used) allows pulling only for those repositories that have
174 'git-daemon-export-ok' file. Adding
176 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
177 our $export_ok = "git-daemon-export-ok";
178 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
180 makes gitweb show and allow access only to those repositories that can be
181 fetched from via `git://` protocol.
183 * Finally, it is possible to specify an arbitrary perl subroutine that will
184 be called for each repository to determine if it can be exported. The
185 subroutine receives an absolute path to the project (repository) as its only
186 parameter (i.e. "$projectroot/$project").
188 For example, if you use mod_perl to run the script, and have dumb
189 HTTP protocol authentication configured for your repositories, you
190 can use the following hook to allow access only if the user is
191 authorized to read the files:
193 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
194 $export_auth_hook = sub {
195 use Apache2::SubRequest ();
196 use Apache2::Const -compile => qw(HTTP_OK);
197 my $path = "$_[0]/HEAD";
198 my $r = Apache2::RequestUtil->request;
199 my $sub = $r->lookup_file($path);
200 return $sub->filename eq $path
201 && $sub->status == Apache2::Const::HTTP_OK;
203 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
206 Per-repository gitweb configuration
207 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
208 You can configure individual repositories shown in gitweb by creating file
209 in the `GIT_DIR` of Git repository, or by setting some repo configuration
210 variable (in `GIT_DIR/config`, see linkgit:git-config[1]).
212 You can use the following files in repository:
215 A html file (HTML fragment) which is included on the gitweb project
216 "summary" page inside `<div>` block element. You can use it for longer
217 description of a project, to provide links (for example to project's
218 homepage), etc. This is recognized only if XSS prevention is off
219 (`$prevent_xss` is false, see linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]); a way to include
220 a README safely when XSS prevention is on may be worked out in the
223 description (or `gitweb.description`)::
224 Short (shortened to `$projects_list_description_width` in the projects
225 list page, which is 25 characters by default; see
226 linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]) single line description of a project (of a
227 repository). Plain text file; HTML will be escaped. By default set to
229 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
230 Unnamed repository; edit this file to name it for gitweb.
231 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
233 from the template during repository creation, usually installed in
234 '/usr/share/git-core/templates/'. You can use the `gitweb.description` repo
235 configuration variable, but the file takes precedence.
237 category (or `gitweb.category`)::
238 Singe line category of a project, used to group projects if
239 `$projects_list_group_categories` is enabled. By default (file and
240 configuration variable absent), uncategorized projects are put in the
241 `$project_list_default_category` category. You can use the
242 `gitweb.category` repo configuration variable, but the file takes
245 The configuration variables `$projects_list_group_categories` and
246 `$project_list_default_category` are described in linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]
248 cloneurl (or multiple-valued `gitweb.url`)::
249 File with repository URL (used for clone and fetch), one per line.
250 Displayed in the project summary page. You can use multiple-valued
251 `gitweb.url` repository configuration variable for that, but the file
254 This is per-repository enhancement / version of global prefix-based
255 `@git_base_url_list` gitweb configuration variable (see
256 linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]).
259 You can use the `gitweb.owner` repository configuration variable to set
260 repository's owner. It is displayed in the project list and summary
263 If it's not set, filesystem directory's owner is used (via GECOS field,
264 i.e. real name field from *getpwuid*(3)) if `$projects_list` is unset
265 (gitweb scans `$projectroot` for repositories); if `$projects_list`
266 points to file with list of repositories, then project owner defaults to
267 value from this file for given repository.
269 various `gitweb.*` config variables (in config)::
270 Read description of `%feature` hash for detailed list, and descriptions.
271 See also "Configuring gitweb features" section in linkgit:gitweb.conf[5]
276 Gitweb can use path_info (component) based URLs, or it can pass all necessary
277 information via query parameters. The typical gitweb URLs are broken down in to
280 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
281 .../gitweb.cgi/<repo>/<action>/<revision>:/<path>?<arguments>
282 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
285 The repository the action will be performed on.
287 All actions except for those that list all available projects,
288 in whatever form, require this parameter.
291 The action that will be run. Defaults to 'projects_list' if repo
292 is not set, and to 'summary' otherwise.
295 Revision shown. Defaults to HEAD.
298 The path within the <repository> that the action is performed on,
299 for those actions that require it.
302 Any arguments that control the behaviour of the action.
304 Some actions require or allow to specify two revisions, and sometimes even two
305 pathnames. In most general form such path_info (component) based gitweb URL
308 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
309 .../gitweb.cgi/<repo>/<action>/<revision_from>:/<path_from>..<revision_to>:/<path_to>?<arguments>
310 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
313 Each action is implemented as a subroutine, and must be present in %actions
314 hash. Some actions are disabled by default, and must be turned on via feature
315 mechanism. For example to enable 'blame' view add the following to gitweb
318 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
319 $feature{'blame'}{'default'} = [1];
320 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
325 The standard actions are:
328 Same as project_list unless `$frontpage_no_project_list` is set to a
329 non-zero value. This is the default command if no repository is
330 specified in the URL.
333 Lists the available Git repositories.
336 Displays summary about given repository. This is the default command if
337 no action is specified in URL, and only repository is specified.
341 Lists all local or all remote-tracking branches in given repository.
343 The latter is not available by default, unless configured.
346 List all tags (lightweight and annotated) in given repository.
350 Shows the files and directories in a given repository path, at given
351 revision. This is default command if no action is specified in the URL,
355 Returns the raw data for the file in given repository, at given path and
356 revision. Links to this action are marked 'raw'.
359 Shows the difference between two revisions of the same file.
363 Shows the blame (also called annotation) information for a file. On a
364 per line basis it shows the revision in which that line was last changed
365 and the user that committed the change. The incremental version (which
366 if configured is used automatically when JavaScript is enabled) uses
367 Ajax to incrementally add blame info to the contents of given file.
369 This action is disabled by default for performance reasons.
373 Shows information about a specific commit in a repository. The 'commit'
374 view shows information about commit in more detail, the 'commitdiff'
375 action shows changeset for given commit.
378 Returns the commit in plain text mail format, suitable for applying with
382 Display specific annotated tag (tag object).
386 Shows log information (commit message or just commit subject) for a
387 given branch (starting from given revision).
389 The 'shortlog' view is more compact; it shows one commit per line.
392 Shows history of the file or directory in a given repository path,
393 starting from given revision (defaults to HEAD, i.e. default branch).
395 This view is similar to 'shortlog' view.
399 Generates an RSS (or Atom) feed of changes to repository.
402 WEBSERVER CONFIGURATION
403 -----------------------
404 This section explains how to configure some common webservers to run gitweb. In
405 all cases, `/path/to/gitweb` in the examples is the directory you ran installed
406 gitweb in, and contains `gitweb_config.perl`.
408 If you've configured a web server that isn't listed here for gitweb, please send
409 in the instructions so they can be included in a future release.
413 Apache must be configured to support CGI scripts in the directory in
414 which gitweb is installed. Let's assume that it is '/var/www/cgi-bin'
417 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
418 ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ "/var/www/cgi-bin/"
420 <Directory "/var/www/cgi-bin">
421 Options Indexes FollowSymlinks ExecCGI
426 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
428 With that configuration the full path to browse repositories would be:
430 http://server/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi
432 Apache with mod_perl, via ModPerl::Registry
433 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
434 You can use mod_perl with gitweb. You must install Apache::Registry
435 (for mod_perl 1.x) or ModPerl::Registry (for mod_perl 2.x) to enable
438 Assuming that gitweb is installed to '/var/www/perl', the following
439 Apache configuration (for mod_perl 2.x) is suitable.
441 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
442 Alias /perl "/var/www/perl"
444 <Directory "/var/www/perl">
445 SetHandler perl-script
446 PerlResponseHandler ModPerl::Registry
447 PerlOptions +ParseHeaders
448 Options Indexes FollowSymlinks +ExecCGI
453 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
455 With that configuration the full path to browse repositories would be:
457 http://server/perl/gitweb.cgi
461 Gitweb works with Apache and FastCGI. First you need to rename, copy
462 or symlink gitweb.cgi to gitweb.fcgi. Let's assume that gitweb is
463 installed in '/usr/share/gitweb' directory. The following Apache
464 configuration is suitable (UNTESTED!)
466 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
467 FastCgiServer /usr/share/gitweb/gitweb.cgi
468 ScriptAlias /gitweb /usr/share/gitweb/gitweb.cgi
470 Alias /gitweb/static /usr/share/gitweb/static
471 <Directory /usr/share/gitweb/static>
472 SetHandler default-handler
474 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
476 With that configuration the full path to browse repositories would be:
481 ADVANCED WEB SERVER SETUP
482 -------------------------
483 All of those examples use request rewriting, and need `mod_rewrite`
484 (or equivalent; examples below are written for Apache).
486 Single URL for gitweb and for fetching
487 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
488 If you want to have one URL for both gitweb and your `http://`
489 repositories, you can configure Apache like this:
491 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
493 ServerName git.example.org
494 DocumentRoot /pub/git
495 SetEnv GITWEB_CONFIG /etc/gitweb.conf
497 # turning on mod rewrite
500 # make the front page an internal rewrite to the gitweb script
501 RewriteRule ^/$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi
503 # make access for "dumb clients" work
504 RewriteRule ^/(.*\.git/(?!/?(HEAD|info|objects|refs)).*)?$ \
505 /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi%{REQUEST_URI} [L,PT]
507 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
509 The above configuration expects your public repositories to live under
510 '/pub/git' and will serve them as `http://git.domain.org/dir-under-pub-git`,
511 both as clonable Git URL and as browseable gitweb interface. If you then
512 start your linkgit:git-daemon[1] with `--base-path=/pub/git --export-all`
513 then you can even use the `git://` URL with exactly the same path.
515 Setting the environment variable `GITWEB_CONFIG` will tell gitweb to use the
516 named file (i.e. in this example '/etc/gitweb.conf') as a configuration for
517 gitweb. You don't really need it in above example; it is required only if
518 your configuration file is in different place than built-in (during
519 compiling gitweb) 'gitweb_config.perl' or '/etc/gitweb.conf'. See
520 linkgit:gitweb.conf[5] for details, especially information about precedence
523 If you use the rewrite rules from the example you *might* also need
524 something like the following in your gitweb configuration file
525 ('/etc/gitweb.conf' following example):
526 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
527 @stylesheets = ("/some/absolute/path/gitweb.css");
530 $per_request_config = 1;
531 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
532 Nowadays though gitweb should create HTML base tag when needed (to set base
533 URI for relative links), so it should work automatically.
536 Webserver configuration with multiple projects' root
537 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
538 If you want to use gitweb with several project roots you can edit your
539 Apache virtual host and gitweb configuration files in the following way.
541 The virtual host configuration (in Apache configuration file) should look
543 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
545 ServerName git.example.org
546 DocumentRoot /pub/git
547 SetEnv GITWEB_CONFIG /etc/gitweb.conf
549 # turning on mod rewrite
552 # make the front page an internal rewrite to the gitweb script
553 RewriteRule ^/$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi [QSA,L,PT]
555 # look for a public_git folder in unix users' home
556 # http://git.example.org/~<user>/
557 RewriteRule ^/\~([^\/]+)(/|/gitweb.cgi)?$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi \
558 [QSA,E=GITWEB_PROJECTROOT:/home/$1/public_git/,L,PT]
560 # http://git.example.org/+<user>/
561 #RewriteRule ^/\+([^\/]+)(/|/gitweb.cgi)?$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi \
562 [QSA,E=GITWEB_PROJECTROOT:/home/$1/public_git/,L,PT]
564 # http://git.example.org/user/<user>/
565 #RewriteRule ^/user/([^\/]+)/(gitweb.cgi)?$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi \
566 [QSA,E=GITWEB_PROJECTROOT:/home/$1/public_git/,L,PT]
568 # defined list of project roots
569 RewriteRule ^/scm(/|/gitweb.cgi)?$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi \
570 [QSA,E=GITWEB_PROJECTROOT:/pub/scm/,L,PT]
571 RewriteRule ^/var(/|/gitweb.cgi)?$ /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi \
572 [QSA,E=GITWEB_PROJECTROOT:/var/git/,L,PT]
574 # make access for "dumb clients" work
575 RewriteRule ^/(.*\.git/(?!/?(HEAD|info|objects|refs)).*)?$ \
576 /cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi%{REQUEST_URI} [L,PT]
578 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
580 Here actual project root is passed to gitweb via `GITWEB_PROJECT_ROOT`
581 environment variable from a web server, so you need to put the following
582 line in gitweb configuration file ('/etc/gitweb.conf' in above example):
583 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
584 $projectroot = $ENV{'GITWEB_PROJECTROOT'} || "/pub/git";
585 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
586 *Note* that this requires to be set for each request, so either
587 `$per_request_config` must be false, or the above must be put in code
588 referenced by `$per_request_config`;
590 These configurations enable two things. First, each unix user (`<user>`) of
591 the server will be able to browse through gitweb Git repositories found in
592 '~/public_git/' with the following url:
594 http://git.example.org/~<user>/
596 If you do not want this feature on your server just remove the second
599 If you already use `mod_userdir` in your virtual host or you don't want to
600 use the \'~' as first character, just comment or remove the second rewrite
601 rule, and uncomment one of the following according to what you want.
603 Second, repositories found in '/pub/scm/' and '/var/git/' will be accessible
604 through `http://git.example.org/scm/` and `http://git.example.org/var/`.
605 You can add as many project roots as you want by adding rewrite rules like
606 the third and the fourth.
611 If you enable PATH_INFO usage in gitweb by putting
612 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
613 $feature{'pathinfo'}{'default'} = [1];
614 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
615 in your gitweb configuration file, it is possible to set up your server so
616 that it consumes and produces URLs in the form
618 http://git.example.com/project.git/shortlog/sometag
620 i.e. without 'gitweb.cgi' part, by using a configuration such as the
621 following. This configuration assumes that '/var/www/gitweb' is the
622 DocumentRoot of your webserver, contains the gitweb.cgi script and
623 complementary static files (stylesheet, favicon, JavaScript):
625 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
627 ServerAlias git.example.com
629 DocumentRoot /var/www/gitweb
631 <Directory /var/www/gitweb>
633 AddHandler cgi-script cgi
635 DirectoryIndex gitweb.cgi
638 RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
639 RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
640 RewriteRule ^.* /gitweb.cgi/$0 [L,PT]
643 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
644 The rewrite rule guarantees that existing static files will be properly
645 served, whereas any other URL will be passed to gitweb as PATH_INFO
648 *Notice* that in this case you don't need special settings for
649 `@stylesheets`, `$my_uri` and `$home_link`, but you lose "dumb client"
650 access to your project .git dirs (described in "Single URL for gitweb and
651 for fetching" section). A possible workaround for the latter is the
652 following: in your project root dir (e.g. '/pub/git') have the projects
653 named *without* a .git extension (e.g. '/pub/git/project' instead of
654 '/pub/git/project.git') and configure Apache as follows:
655 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
657 ServerAlias git.example.com
659 DocumentRoot /var/www/gitweb
661 AliasMatch ^(/.*?)(\.git)(/.*)?$ /pub/git$1$3
662 <Directory /var/www/gitweb>
664 AddHandler cgi-script cgi
666 DirectoryIndex gitweb.cgi
669 RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
670 RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
671 RewriteRule ^.* /gitweb.cgi/$0 [L,PT]
674 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
676 The additional AliasMatch makes it so that
678 http://git.example.com/project.git
680 will give raw access to the project's Git dir (so that the project can be
683 http://git.example.com/project
685 will provide human-friendly gitweb access.
687 This solution is not 100% bulletproof, in the sense that if some project has
688 a named ref (branch, tag) starting with 'git/', then paths such as
690 http://git.example.com/project/command/abranch..git/abranch
692 will fail with a 404 error.
697 Please report any bugs or feature requests to git@vger.kernel.org,
698 putting "gitweb" in the subject of email.
702 linkgit:gitweb.conf[5], linkgit:git-instaweb[1]
704 'gitweb/README', 'gitweb/INSTALL'
708 Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite