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Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/gitcredentials.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | Documentation/gitcredentials.txt | 94 |
1 files changed, 91 insertions, 3 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/gitcredentials.txt b/Documentation/gitcredentials.txt index adc759612d..1814d2d23c 100644 --- a/Documentation/gitcredentials.txt +++ b/Documentation/gitcredentials.txt @@ -131,7 +131,9 @@ context would not match: because the hostnames differ. Nor would it match `foo.example.com`; Git compares hostnames exactly, without considering whether two hosts are part of the same domain. Likewise, a config entry for `http://example.com` would not -match: Git compares the protocols exactly. +match: Git compares the protocols exactly. However, you may use wildcards in +the domain name and other pattern matching techniques as with the `http.<url>.*` +options. If the "pattern" URL does include a path component, then this too must match exactly: the context `https://example.com/bar/baz.git` will match a config @@ -186,8 +188,94 @@ CUSTOM HELPERS -------------- You can write your own custom helpers to interface with any system in -which you keep credentials. See the documentation for Git's -link:technical/api-credentials.html[credentials API] for details. +which you keep credentials. + +Credential helpers are programs executed by Git to fetch or save +credentials from and to long-term storage (where "long-term" is simply +longer than a single Git process; e.g., credentials may be stored +in-memory for a few minutes, or indefinitely on disk). + +Each helper is specified by a single string in the configuration +variable `credential.helper` (and others, see linkgit:git-config[1]). +The string is transformed by Git into a command to be executed using +these rules: + + 1. If the helper string begins with "!", it is considered a shell + snippet, and everything after the "!" becomes the command. + + 2. Otherwise, if the helper string begins with an absolute path, the + verbatim helper string becomes the command. + + 3. Otherwise, the string "git credential-" is prepended to the helper + string, and the result becomes the command. + +The resulting command then has an "operation" argument appended to it +(see below for details), and the result is executed by the shell. + +Here are some example specifications: + +---------------------------------------------------- +# run "git credential-foo" +foo + +# same as above, but pass an argument to the helper +foo --bar=baz + +# the arguments are parsed by the shell, so use shell +# quoting if necessary +foo --bar="whitespace arg" + +# you can also use an absolute path, which will not use the git wrapper +/path/to/my/helper --with-arguments + +# or you can specify your own shell snippet +!f() { echo "password=`cat $HOME/.secret`"; }; f +---------------------------------------------------- + +Generally speaking, rule (3) above is the simplest for users to specify. +Authors of credential helpers should make an effort to assist their +users by naming their program "git-credential-$NAME", and putting it in +the `$PATH` or `$GIT_EXEC_PATH` during installation, which will allow a +user to enable it with `git config credential.helper $NAME`. + +When a helper is executed, it will have one "operation" argument +appended to its command line, which is one of: + +`get`:: + + Return a matching credential, if any exists. + +`store`:: + + Store the credential, if applicable to the helper. + +`erase`:: + + Remove a matching credential, if any, from the helper's storage. + +The details of the credential will be provided on the helper's stdin +stream. The exact format is the same as the input/output format of the +`git credential` plumbing command (see the section `INPUT/OUTPUT +FORMAT` in linkgit:git-credential[1] for a detailed specification). + +For a `get` operation, the helper should produce a list of attributes on +stdout in the same format (see linkgit:git-credential[1] for common +attributes). A helper is free to produce a subset, or even no values at +all if it has nothing useful to provide. Any provided attributes will +overwrite those already known about by Git. If a helper outputs a +`quit` attribute with a value of `true` or `1`, no further helpers will +be consulted, nor will the user be prompted (if no credential has been +provided, the operation will then fail). + +For a `store` or `erase` operation, the helper's output is ignored. +If it fails to perform the requested operation, it may complain to +stderr to inform the user. If it does not support the requested +operation (e.g., a read-only store), it should silently ignore the +request. + +If a helper receives any other operation, it should silently ignore the +request. This leaves room for future operations to be added (older +helpers will just ignore the new requests). GIT --- |