Simple Git

A lightweight interface for running git commands in any node.js application.

Version 3 - Out Now

From v3 of simple-git you can now import as an ES module, Common JS module or as TypeScript with bundled type definitions. Upgrading from v2 will be seamless for any application not relying on APIs that were marked as deprecated in v2 (deprecation notices were logged to stdout as console.warn in v2).

Installation

Use your favourite package manager:

• npm: npm install simple-git
• yarn: yarn add simple-git

System Dependencies

Requires git to be installed and that it can be called using the command git.

Usage

Include into your JavaScript app using common js:

// require the library, main export is a function
const simpleGit = require('simple-git');
simpleGit().clean(simpleGit.CleanOptions.FORCE);

// or use named properties
const { simpleGit, CleanOptions } = require('simple-git');
simpleGit().clean(CleanOptions.FORCE);

Include into your JavaScript app as an ES Module:

import { simpleGit, CleanOptions } from 'simple-git';

simpleGit().clean(CleanOptions.FORCE);

Include in a TypeScript app using the bundled type definitions:

import { simpleGit, SimpleGit, CleanOptions } from 'simple-git';

const git: SimpleGit = simpleGit().clean(CleanOptions.FORCE);

Configuration

Configure each simple-git instance with a properties object passed to the main simpleGit function:

import { simpleGit, SimpleGit, SimpleGitOptions } from 'simple-git';

const options: Partial<SimpleGitOptions> = {
   baseDir: process.cwd(),
   binary: 'git',
   maxConcurrentProcesses: 6,
   trimmed: false,
};

// when setting all options in a single object
const git: SimpleGit = simpleGit(options);

// or split out the baseDir, supported for backward compatibility
const git: SimpleGit = simpleGit('/some/path', { binary: 'git' });

The first argument can be either a string (representing the working directory for git commands to run in), SimpleGitOptions object or undefined, the second parameter is an optional SimpleGitOptions object.

All configuration properties are optional, the default values are shown in the example above.

Per-command Configuration

To prefix the commands run by simple-git with custom configuration not saved in the git config (ie: using the -c command) supply a config option to the instance builder:

// configure the instance with a custom configuration property
const git: SimpleGit = simpleGit('/some/path', { config: ['http.proxy=someproxy'] });

// any command executed will be prefixed with this config
// runs: git -c http.proxy=someproxy pull
await git.pull();

Configuring Plugins

• AbortController Terminate pending and future tasks in a simple-git instance (requires node >= 16).

• Completion Detection Customise how simple-git detects the end of a git process.

• Error Detection Customise the detection of errors from the underlying git process.

• Progress Events Receive progress events as git works through long-running processes.

• Spawned Process Ownership Configure the system uid / gid to use for spawned git processes.

• Timeout Automatically kill the wrapped git process after a rolling timeout.

• Unsafe Selectively opt out of simple-git safety precautions - for advanced users and use cases.

Using Task Promises

Each task in the API returns the simpleGit instance for chaining together multiple tasks, and each step in the chain is also a Promise that can be await ed in an async function or returned in a Promise chain.

const git = simpleGit();

// chain together tasks to await final result
await git.init().addRemote('origin', '...remote.git');

// or await each step individually
await git.init();
await git.addRemote('origin', '...remote.git');

Catching errors in async code

To catch errors in async code, either wrap the whole chain in a try/catch:

const git = simpleGit();
try {
   await git.init();
   await git.addRemote(name, repoUrl);
} catch (e) {
   /* handle all errors here */
}

or catch individual steps to permit the main chain to carry on executing rather than jumping to the final catch on the first error:

const git = simpleGit();
try {
   await git.init().catch(ignoreError);
   await git.addRemote(name, repoUrl);
} catch (e) {
   /* handle all errors here */
}

function ignoreError() {}

Using Task Callbacks

In addition to returning a promise, each method can also be called with a trailing callback argument to handle the result of the task.

const git = simpleGit();
git.init(onInit).addRemote('origin', '[email protected]:steveukx/git-js.git', onRemoteAdd);

function onInit(err, initResult) {}
function onRemoteAdd(err, addRemoteResult) {}

If any of the steps in the chain result in an error, all pending steps will be cancelled, see the parallel tasks section for more information on how to run tasks in parallel rather than in series .

Task Responses

Whether using a trailing callback or a Promise, tasks either return the raw string or Buffer response from the git binary, or where possible a parsed interpretation of the response.

For type details of the response for each of the tasks, please see the TypeScript definitions.

API

git apply

• .applyPatch(patch, [options]) applies a single string patch (as generated by git diff), optionally configured with the supplied options to set any arguments supported by the apply command. Returns the unmodified string response from stdout of the git binary.
• .applyPatch(patches, [options]) applies an array of string patches (as generated by git diff), optionally configured with the supplied options to set any arguments supported by the apply command. Returns the unmodified string response from stdout of the git binary.

git branch

• .branch([options]) uses the supplied options to run any arguments supported by the branch command. Either returns a BranchSummaryResult instance when listing branches, or a BranchSingleDeleteResult type object when the options included -d, -D or --delete which cause it to delete a named branch rather than list existing branches.
• .branchLocal() gets a list of local branches as a BranchSummaryResult instance
• .deleteLocalBranch(branchName) deletes a local branch - treats a failed attempt as an error
• .deleteLocalBranch(branchName, forceDelete) deletes a local branch, optionally explicitly setting forceDelete to true - treats a failed attempt as an error
• .deleteLocalBranches(branchNames) deletes multiple local branches
• .deleteLocalBranches(branchNames, forceDelete) deletes multiple local branches, optionally explicitly setting forceDelete to true

git clean

• .clean(mode) clean the working tree. Mode should be "n" - dry run or "f" - force
• .clean(cleanSwitches [,options]) set cleanSwitches to a string containing any number of the supported single character options, optionally with a standard options object

git checkout

• .checkout(checkoutWhat , [options]) - checks out the supplied tag, revision or branch when supplied as a string, additional arguments supported by git checkout can be supplied as an options object/array.

• .checkout(options) - check out a tag or revision using the supplied options

• .checkoutBranch(branchName, startPoint) - checks out a new branch from the supplied start point.

• .checkoutLocalBranch(branchName) - checks out a new local branch

git clone

• .clone(repoPath, [localPath, [options]]) clone a remote repo at repoPath to a local directory at localPath, optionally with a standard options object of additional arguments to include between git clone and the trailing repo local arguments

• .clone(repoPath, [options]) clone a remote repo at repoPath to a directory in the current working directory with the same name as the repo

• mirror(repoPath, [localPath, [options]]) behaves the same as the .clone interface with the --mirror flag enabled.

git config

• .addConfig(key, value, append = false, scope = 'local') add a local configuration property, when append is set to true the configuration setting is appended to rather than overwritten in the local config. Use the scope argument to pick where to save the new configuration setting (use the exported GitConfigScope enum, or equivalent string values - worktree | local | global | system).

• .getConfig(key) get the value(s) for a named key as a ConfigGetResult

• .getConfig(key, scope) get the value(s) for a named key as a ConfigGetResult but limit the scope of the properties searched to a single specified scope (use the exported GitConfigScope enum, or equivalent string values - worktree | local | global | system)

• .listConfig() reads the current configuration and returns a ConfigListSummary

• .listConfig(scope: GitConfigScope) as with listConfig but returns only those items in a specified scope (note that configuration values are overlaid on top of each other to build the config git will actually use - to resolve the configuration you are using use (await listConfig()).all without the scope argument)

git diff

• .diff([ options ]) get the diff of the current repo compared to the last commit, optionally including any number of other arguments supported by git diff supplied as an options object/array. Returns the raw diff output as a string.

• .diffSummary([ options ]) creates a DiffResult to summarise the diff for files in the repo. Uses the --stat format by default which can be overridden by passing in any of the log format commands (eg: --numstat or --name-stat) as part of the optional options object/array.

git grep examples

• .grep(searchTerm) searches for a single search term across all files in the working tree, optionally passing a standard options object of additional arguments
• .grep(grepQueryBuilder(...)) use the grepQueryBuilder to create a complex query to search for, optionally passing a standard options object of additional arguments

git hash-object

• .hashObject(filePath, write = false) computes the object ID value for the contents of the named file (which can be outside of the work tree), optionally writing the resulting value to the object database.

git init

• .init(bare , [options]) initialize a repository using the boolean bare parameter to intialise a bare repository. Any number of other arguments supported by git init can be supplied as an options object/array.

• .init([options]) initialize a repository using any arguments supported by git init supplied as an options object/array.

git log

• .log([options]) list commits between options.from and options.to tags or branch (if not specified will show all history). Use the options object to set any options supported by the git log command or any of the following:

  • options.file - the path to a file in your repository to only consider this path.
  • options.format - custom log format object, keys are the property names used on the returned object, values are the format string from pretty formats
  • options.from - sets the oldest commit in the range to return, use along with options.to to set a bounded range
  • options.mailMap - defaults to true, enables the use of mail map in returned values for email and name from the default format
  • options.maxCount - equivalent to setting the --max-count option
  • options.multiLine - enables multiline body values in the default format (disabled by default)
  • options.splitter - the character sequence to use as a delimiter between fields in the log, should be a value that doesn't appear in any log message (defaults to ò)
  • options.strictDate - switches the authored date value from an ISO 8601-like format to be strict ISO 8601 format
  • options.symmetric - defaults to true, enables symmetric revision range rather than a two-dot range
  • options.to - sets the newset commit in the range to return, use along with options.from to set a bounded range

git merge

• .merge(options) runs a merge using any configuration options supported by git merge. Conflicts during the merge result in an error response, the response is an instance of MergeSummary whether it was an error or success. When successful, the MergeSummary has all detail from a the PullSummary along with summary detail for the merge. When the merge failed, the MergeSummary contains summary detail for why the merge failed and which files prevented the merge.

• .mergeFromTo(remote, branch , [options]) - merge from the specified branch into the currently checked out branch, similar to .merge but with the remote and branch supplied as strings separately to any additional options.

git mv

• .mv(from, to) rename or move a single file at from to to

• .mv(from, to) move all files in the from array to the to directory

git pull

• .pull([options]) pulls all updates from the default tracked remote, any arguments supported by git pull can be supplied as an options object/array.

• .pull(remote, branch, [options]) pulls all updates from the specified remote branch (eg 'origin'/'master') along with any custom options object/array

git push

• .push([options]) pushes to a named remote/branch using any supported options from the git push command. Note that simple-git enforces the use of --verbose --porcelain options in order to parse the response. You don't need to supply these options.

• .push(remote, branch, [options]) pushes to a named remote/branch, supports additional options from the git push command.

• .pushTags(remote, [options]) pushes local tags to a named remote (equivalent to using .push([remote, '--tags']))

git remote

• .addRemote(name, repo, [options]) adds a new named remote to be tracked as name at the path repo, optionally with any supported options for the git add call.
• .getRemotes([verbose]) gets a list of the named remotes, supply the optional verbose option as true to include the URLs and purpose of each ref
• .listRemote([options]) lists remote repositories - there are so many optional arguments in the underlying git ls-remote call, just supply any you want to use as the optional options eg: git.listRemote(['--heads', '--tags'], console.log)
• .remote([options]) runs a git remote command with any number of options
• .removeRemote(name) removes the named remote

git reset

• .reset(resetMode, [resetOptions]) resets the repository, sets the reset mode to one of the supported types (use a constant from the exported ResetMode enum, or a string equivalent: mixed, soft, hard, merge, keep). Any number of other arguments supported by git reset can be supplied as an options object/array.

• .reset(resetOptions) resets the repository with the supplied options

• .reset() resets the repository in soft mode.

git rev-parse / repo properties

• .revparse([options]) sends the supplied options to git rev-parse and returns the string response from git.

• .checkIsRepo() gets whether the current working directory is a descendent of a git repository.

• .checkIsRepo('bare') gets whether the current working directory is within a bare git repo (see either git clone --bare or git init --bare).

• .checkIsRepo('root') gets whether the current working directory is the root directory for a repo (sub-directories will return false).

git show

• .show(options) show various types of objects for example the file content at a certain commit. options is the single value string or any options supported by the git show command.
• .showBuffer(options) same as the .show api, but returns the Buffer content directly to allow for showing binary file content.

git status

• .status([options]) gets the status of the current repo, resulting in a StatusResult. Additional arguments supported by git status can be supplied as an options object/array.

git submodule

• .subModule(options) Run a git submodule command with on or more arguments passed in as an options array or object
• .submoduleAdd(repo, path) Adds a new sub module
• .submoduleInit([options] Initialises sub modules, the optional options argument can be used to pass extra options to the git submodule init command.
• .submoduleUpdate(subModuleName, [options]) Updates sub modules, can be called with a sub module name and options, just the options or with no arguments

git stash

• .stash([ options ]) Stash the working directory, optional first argument can be an array of string arguments or options object to pass to the git stash command.

• .stashList([ options ]) Retrieves the stash list, optional first argument can be an object in the same format as used in git log.

git version examples

• .version() retrieve the major, minor and patch for the currently installed git. Use the .installed property of the result to determine whether git is accessible on the path.

changing the working directory examples

• .cwd(workingDirectory) Sets the working directory for all future commands - note, this will change the working for the root instance, any chain created from the root will also be changed.
• .cwd({ path, root = false }) Sets the working directory for all future commands either in the current chain of commands (where root is omitted or set to false) or in the main instance (where root is true).

How to Specify Options

Where the task accepts custom options (eg: pull or commit), these can be supplied as an object, the keys of which will all be merged as trailing arguments in the command string, or as a simple array of strings.

Options as an Object

When the value of the property in the options object is a string, that name value pair will be included in the command string as name=value. For example:

// results in 'git pull origin master --no-rebase'
git.pull('origin', 'master', { '--no-rebase': null });

// results in 'git pull origin master --rebase=true'
git.pull('origin', 'master', { '--rebase': 'true' });

Options as an Array

Options can also be supplied as an array of strings to be merged into the task's commands in the same way as when an object is used:

// results in 'git pull origin master --no-rebase'
git.pull('origin', 'master', ['--no-rebase']);

Release History

Major release 3.x changes the packaging of the library, making it consumable as a CommonJS module, ES module as well as with TypeScript (see usage above). The library is now published as a single file, so please ensure your application hasn't been making use of non-documented APIs by importing from a sub-directory path.

See also:

• release notes v3
• release notes v2

Concurrent / Parallel Requests

When the methods of simple-git are chained together, they create an execution chain that will run in series, useful for when the tasks themselves are order-dependent, eg:

simpleGit().init().addRemote('origin', 'https://some-repo.git').fetch();

Each task requires that the one before it has been run successfully before it is called, any errors in a step of the chain should prevent later steps from being attempted.

When the methods of simple-git are called on the root instance (ie: git = simpleGit()) rather than chained off another task, it starts a new chain and will not be affected failures in tasks already being run. Useful for when the tasks are independent of each other, eg:

const git = simpleGit();
const results = await Promise.all([
   git.raw('rev-parse', '--show-cdup').catch(swallow),
   git.raw('rev-parse', '--show-prefix').catch(swallow),
]);
function swallow(err) {
   return null;
}

Each simple-git instance limits the number of spawned child processes that can be run simultaneously and manages the queue of pending tasks for you. Configure this value by passing an options object to the simpleGit function, eg:

const git = simpleGit({ maxConcurrentProcesses: 10 });

Treating tasks called on the root instance as the start of separate chains is a change to the behaviour of simple-git and was added in version 2.11.0.

Complex Requests

When no suitable wrapper exists in the interface for creating a request, run the command directly using git.raw([...], handler). The array of commands are passed directly to the git binary:

const path = '/path/to/repo';
const commands = ['config', '--global', 'advice.pushNonFastForward', 'false'];

// using an array of commands and node-style callback
simpleGit(path).raw(commands, (err, result) => {
   // err is null unless this command failed
   // result is the raw output of this command
});

// using a var-args of strings and awaiting rather than using the callback
const result = await simpleGit(path).raw(...commands);

// automatically trim trailing white-space in responses
const result = await simpleGit(path, { trimmed: true }).raw(...commands);

Authentication

The easiest way to supply a username / password to the remote host is to include it in the URL, for example:

const USER = 'something';
const PASS = 'somewhere';
const REPO = 'github.com/username/private-repo';

const remote = `https://${USER}:${PASS}@${REPO}`;

simpleGit()
   .clone(remote)
   .then(() => console.log('finished'))
   .catch((err) => console.error('failed: ', err));

Be sure to not enable debug logging when using this mechanism for authentication to ensure passwords aren't logged to stdout.

Environment Variables

Pass one or more environment variables to the child processes spawned by simple-git with the .env method which supports passing either an object of name=value pairs or setting a single variable at a time:

const GIT_SSH_COMMAND = 'ssh -o UserKnownHostsFile=/dev/null -o StrictHostKeyChecking=no';

simpleGit()
   .env('GIT_SSH_COMMAND', GIT_SSH_COMMAND)
   .status((err, status) => {
      /*  */
   });

simpleGit()
   .env({ ...process.env, GIT_SSH_COMMAND })
   .status()
   .then((status) => {})
   .catch((err) => {});

Note - when passing environment variables into the child process, these will replace the standard process.env variables, the example above creates a new object based on process.env but with the GIT_SSH_COMMAND property added.

Exception Handling

When the git process exits with a non-zero status (or in some cases like merge the git process exits with a successful zero code but there are conflicts in the merge) the task will reject with a GitError when there is no available parser to handle the error or a GitResponseError for when there is.

See the err property of the callback:

git.merge((err, mergeSummary) => {
   if (err.git) {
      mergeSummary = err.git; // the failed mergeSummary
   }
});

Catch errors with try/catch in async code:

try {
   const mergeSummary = await git.merge();
   console.log(`Merged ${mergeSummary.merges.length} files`);
} catch (err) {
   // err.message - the string summary of the error
   // err.stack - some stack trace detail
   // err.git - where a parser was able to run, this is the parsed content

   console.error(`Merge resulted in ${err.git.conflicts.length} conflicts`);
}

Catch errors with a .catch on the promise:

const mergeSummary = await git.merge().catch((err) => {
   if (err.git) {
      return err.git;
   } // the unsuccessful mergeSummary
   throw err; // some other error, so throw
});

if (mergeSummary.failed) {
   console.error(`Merge resulted in ${mergeSummary.conflicts.length} conflicts`);
}

With typed errors available in TypeScript

import { simpleGit, MergeSummary, GitResponseError } from 'simple-git';
try {
   const mergeSummary = await simpleGit().merge();
   console.log(`Merged ${mergeSummary.merges.length} files`);
} catch (err) {
   // err.message - the string summary of the error
   // err.stack - some stack trace detail
   // err.git - where a parser was able to run, this is the parsed content
   const mergeSummary: MergeSummary = (err as GitResponseError<MergeSummary>).git;
   const conflicts = mergeSummary?.conflicts || [];

   console.error(`Merge resulted in ${conflicts.length} conflicts`);
}

Troubleshooting / FAQ

Enable logging

See the debug logging guide for logging examples and how to make use of the debug library's programmatic interface in your application.

Enable Verbose Logging

See the debug logging guide for the full list of verbose logging options to use with the debug library.

Every command returns ENOENT error message

There are a few potential reasons:

• git isn't available as a binary for the user running the main node process, custom paths to the binary can be used with the .customBinary(...) api option.

• the working directory passed in to the main simple-git function isn't accessible, check it is read/write accessible by the user running the node process. This library uses @kwsites/file-exists to validate the working directory exists, to output its logs add @kwsites/file-exists to your DEBUG environment variable. eg:

  DEBUG=@kwsites/file-exists,simple-git node ./your-app.js

Log format fails

The properties of git log are fetched using the --pretty=format argument which supports different tokens depending on the version of git - for example the %D token used to show the refs was added in git 2.2.3, for any version before that please ensure you are supplying your own format object with properties supported by the version of git you are using.

For more details of the supported tokens, please see the official git log documentation

Log response properties are out of order

The properties of git.log are fetched using the character sequence ò as a delimiter. If your commit messages use this sequence, supply a custom splitter in the options, for example: git.log({ splitter: '💻' })

Pull / Diff / Merge summary responses don't recognise any files

• Enable verbose logs with the environment variable DEBUG=simple-git:task:*,simple-git:output:*
• Check the output (for example: simple-git:output:diff:1 [stdOut] 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+))
• Check the stdOut output is the same as you would expect to see when running the command directly in terminal
• Check the language used in the response is english locale

In some cases git will show progress messages or additional detail on error states in the output for stdErr that will help debug your issue, these messages are also included in the verbose log.

Legacy Node Versions

From v3.x, simple-git will drop support for node.js version 10 or below, to use in a lower version of node will result in errors such as:

• Object.fromEntries is not a function
• Object.entries is not a function
• message.flatMap is not a function

To resolve these issues, either upgrade to a newer version of node.js or ensure you are using the necessary polyfills from core-js - see Legacy Node Versions.

Examples

using a pathspec to limit the scope of the task

If the simple-git api doesn't explicitly limit the scope of the task being run (ie: git.add() requires the files to be added, but git.status() will run against the entire repo), add a pathspec to the command using trailing options:

import { simpleGit, pathspec } from "simple-git";

const git = simpleGit();
const wholeRepoStatus = await git.status();
const subDirStatusUsingOptArray = await git.status([pathspec('sub-dir')]);
const subDirStatusUsingOptObject = await git.status({ 'sub-dir': pathspec('sub-dir') });

async await

async function status(workingDir) {
   let statusSummary = null;
   try {
      statusSummary = await simpleGit(workingDir).status();
   } catch (e) {
      // handle the error
   }

   return statusSummary;
}

// using the async function
status(__dirname + '/some-repo').then((status) => console.log(status));

Initialise a git repo if necessary

const git = simpleGit(__dirname);

git.checkIsRepo()
   .then((isRepo) => !isRepo && initialiseRepo(git))
   .then(() => git.fetch());

function initialiseRepo(git) {
   return git.init().then(() => git.addRemote('origin', 'https://some.git.repo'));
}

Update repo and get a list of tags

simpleGit(__dirname + '/some-repo')
   .pull()
   .tags((err, tags) => console.log('Latest available tag: %s', tags.latest));

// update repo and when there are changes, restart the app
simpleGit().pull((err, update) => {
   if (update && update.summary.changes) {
      require('child_process').exec('npm restart');
   }
});

Starting a new repo

simpleGit()
   .init()
   .add('./*')
   .commit('first commit!')
   .addRemote('origin', 'https://github.com/user/repo.git')
   .push('origin', 'master');

push with -u

simpleGit()
   .add('./*')
   .commit('first commit!')
   .addRemote('origin', 'some-repo-url')
   .push(['-u', 'origin', 'master'], () => console.log('done'));

Piping to the console for long-running tasks

See progress events for more details on logging progress updates.

const git = simpleGit({
   progress({ method, stage, progress }) {
      console.log(`git.${method} ${stage} stage ${progress}% complete`);
   },
});
git.checkout('https://github.com/user/repo.git');

Update repo and print messages when there are changes, restart the app

// when using a chain
simpleGit()
   .exec(() => console.log('Starting pull...'))
   .pull((err, update) => {
      if (update && update.summary.changes) {
         require('child_process').exec('npm restart');
      }
   })
   .exec(() => console.log('pull done.'));

// when using async and optional chaining
const git = simpleGit();
console.log('Starting pull...');
if ((await git.pull())?.summary.changes) {
   require('child_process').exec('npm restart');
}
console.log('pull done.');

Get a full commits list, and then only between 0.11.0 and 0.12.0 tags

console.log(await simpleGit().log());
console.log(await simpleGit().log('0.11.0', '0.12.0'));

Set the local configuration for author, then author for an individual commit

simpleGit()
   .addConfig('user.name', 'Some One')
   .addConfig('user.email', '[email protected]')
   .commit('committed as "Some One"', 'file-one')
   .commit('committed as "Another Person"', 'file-two', {
      '--author': '"Another Person <[email protected]>"',
   });

Get remote repositories

simpleGit().listRemote(['--get-url'], (err, data) => {
   if (!err) {
      console.log('Remote url for repository at ' + __dirname + ':');
      console.log(data);
   }
});