How to use "$@" in a Git alias?-CodePudding

git log --name-status --pretty=format: | sed '/^$/d' | cut --fields=2- | sort | uniq --count | sort --numeric-sort --reverse | head prints the 10 most edited files in a Git repo (based on this). I want to create a Git alias most-edited for this command with one caveat: the command should put any extra arguments into the git log command. This would allow me to run git most-edited 'foo bar/' baz/ to get the most edited files in the foo bar (note the space) and baz directories.

In a script this would be as simple as adding -- "$@" to the git log command. However, if I create an alias most-edited = !git log --name-status --pretty=format: -- "$@" | sed '/^$/d' | cut --fields=2- | sort | uniq --count | sort --numeric-sort --reverse | head the arguments are instead passed to the last command in the pipeline, head. Is there some way to pass the arguments to git log?

CodePudding user response：

In the alias, define a function followed by an immediate call to the function. When the alias is expanded, any additional arguments on the command line become arguments to that function.

most-edited = '!f () { git log --name-status --pretty=format: -- "$@" | sed '/^$/d' | cut --fields=2- | sort | uniq --count | sort --numeric-sort --reverse | head; }; f'

CodePudding user response：

Long

Both iBug's answer ("write your own script and make it Git-callable") and chepner's answer ("use an alias that invokes a shell function") work fine, and are fully generic. There's one more possibility here, which is quite tricky, but also illustrative. I like to use the wc command to help show how the arguments get broken up:

[alias]
    visargs = "!wc head \"$@\" tail #"

Running:

GIT_TRACE=1 git visargs "one two" three

produces this output:

18:58:34.031386 git.c:702               trace: exec: git-visargs 'one two' three
18:58:34.031749 run-command.c:663       trace: run_command: git-visargs 'one two' three
18:58:34.032434 run-command.c:663       trace: run_command: 'wc head "$@" tail #' 'one two' three
wc: head: open: No such file or directory
wc: one two: open: No such file or directory
wc: three: open: No such file or directory
wc: tail: open: No such file or directory
       0       0       0 total

Note how the arguments were passed through to wc correctly: one two, as a single argument, got through as a single argument, and three got through as a single argument as well. The wc command got the arguments head and tail separately, and did not get a repeated set of arguments, even though, as we can see from the trace lines, the command run was really:

trace: run_command: 'wc head "$@" tail #' 'one two' three

The first expression is fed straight to sh as its -c argument. The remaining expressions are $1, $2, and so on. That's why the $@ works where it is, but also why we need the comment character: without the #, the arguments get tacked onto the final part of the alias expansion.

CodePudding user response：

Save your shell script to a file named git-most-edited somewhere in the $PATH, like ~/.local/bin/, and do chmod 755 on the file.

#!/bin/sh

git log --name-status --pretty=format: -- "$@" | sed '/^$/d' | cut --fields=2- | sort | uniq --count | sort --numeric-sort --reverse | head

You can then run git most-edited and Git will invoke your shell script for you.