annotate doc/hg.1.txt @ 3257:c9cd63a6fce9

Add documentation about the date formats allowed in the command line

HG(1)
=====
Matt Mackall <[e-mail]>

NAME
----
hg - Mercurial source code management system

SYNOPSIS
--------
'hg' [-v -d -q -y] <command> [command options] [files]

DESCRIPTION
-----------
The hg(1) command provides a command line interface to the Mercurial system.

COMMAND ELEMENTS
----------------

files ...::
    indicates one or more filename or relative path filenames; see
    "FILE NAME PATTERNS" for information on pattern matching

path::
    indicates a path on the local machine

revision::
    indicates a changeset which can be specified as a changeset revision
    number, a tag, or a unique substring of the changeset hash value

repository path::
    either the pathname of a local repository or the URI of a remote
    repository.  There are two available URI protocols, http:// which is
    fast and the static-http:// protocol which is much slower but does not
    require a special server on the web host.


include::hg.1.gendoc.txt[]

FILE NAME PATTERNS
------------------

    Mercurial accepts several notations for identifying one or more
    files at a time.

    By default, Mercurial treats filenames as shell-style extended
    glob patterns.

    Alternate pattern notations must be specified explicitly.

    To use a plain path name without any pattern matching, start a
    name with "path:".  These path names must match completely, from
    the root of the current repository.

    To use an extended glob, start a name with "glob:".  Globs are
    rooted at the current directory; a glob such as "*.c" will match
    files ending in ".c" in the current directory only.

    The supported glob syntax extensions are "**" to match any string
    across path separators, and "{a,b}" to mean "a or b".

    To use a Perl/Python regular expression, start a name with "re:".
    Regexp pattern matching is anchored at the root of the repository.

    Plain examples:

    path:foo/bar   a name bar in a directory named foo in the root of
                   the repository
    path:path:name a file or directory named "path:name"

    Glob examples:

    glob:*.c       any name ending in ".c" in the current directory
    *.c            any name ending in ".c" in the current directory
    **.c           any name ending in ".c" in the current directory, or
                   any subdirectory
    foo/*.c        any name ending in ".c" in the directory foo
    foo/**.c       any name ending in ".c" in the directory foo, or any
                   subdirectory

    Regexp examples:

    re:.*\.c$      any name ending in ".c", anywhere in the repository


SPECIFYING SINGLE REVISIONS
---------------------------

    Mercurial accepts several notations for identifying individual
    revisions.

    A plain integer is treated as a revision number.  Negative
    integers are treated as offsets from the tip, with -1 denoting the
    tip.

    A 40-digit hexadecimal string is treated as a unique revision
    identifier.

    A hexadecimal string less than 40 characters long is treated as a
    unique revision identifier, and referred to as a short-form
    identifier.  A short-form identifier is only valid if it is the
    prefix of one full-length identifier.

    Any other string is treated as a tag name, which is a symbolic
    name associated with a revision identifier.  Tag names may not
    contain the ":" character.

    The reserved name "tip" is a special tag that always identifies
    the most recent revision.

SPECIFYING MULTIPLE REVISIONS
-----------------------------

    When Mercurial accepts more than one revision, they may be
    specified individually, or provided as a continuous range,
    separated by the ":" character.

    The syntax of range notation is [BEGIN]:[END], where BEGIN and END
    are revision identifiers.  Both BEGIN and END are optional.  If
    BEGIN is not specified, it defaults to revision number 0.  If END
    is not specified, it defaults to the tip.  The range ":" thus
    means "all revisions".

    If BEGIN is greater than END, revisions are treated in reverse
    order.

    A range acts as a closed interval.  This means that a range of 3:5
    gives 3, 4 and 5.  Similarly, a range of 4:2 gives 4, 3, and 2.

DATE FORMATS
------------

    Some commands (backout, commit, tag) allow the user to specify a date.
    Possible formats for dates are:

YYYY-mm-dd \HH:MM[:SS] [(+|-)NNNN]::
    This is a subset of ISO 8601, allowing just the recommended notations
    for date and time. The last part represents the timezone; if omitted,
    local time is assumed. Examples:

    "2005-08-22 03:27 -0700"

    "2006-04-19 21:39:51"

aaa bbb dd HH:MM:SS YYYY [(+|-)NNNN]::
    This is the date format used by the C library. Here, aaa stands for
    abbreviated weekday name and bbb for abbreviated month name. The last
    part represents the timezone; if omitted, local time is assumed.
    Examples:

    "Mon Aug 22 03:27:00 2005 -0700"

    "Wed Apr 19 21:39:51 2006"

unixtime offset::
    This is the internal representation format for dates. unixtime is
    the number of seconds since the epoch (1970-01-01 00:00 UTC). offset
    is the offset of the local timezone, in seconds west of UTC (negative
    if the timezone is east of UTC).
    Examples:

    "1124706420 25200" (2005-08-22 03:27:00 -0700)

    "1145475591 -7200" (2006-04-19 21:39:51 +0200)

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
---------------------

HGEDITOR::
    This is the name of the editor to use when committing. Defaults to the
    value of EDITOR.

    (deprecated, use .hgrc)

HGMERGE::
    An executable to use for resolving merge conflicts. The program
    will be executed with three arguments: local file, remote file,
    ancestor file.

    The default program is "hgmerge", which is a shell script provided
    by Mercurial with some sensible defaults.

    (deprecated, use .hgrc)

HGRCPATH::
    A list of files or directories to search for hgrc files.  Item
    separator is ":" on Unix, ";" on Windows.  If HGRCPATH is not set,
    platform default search path is used.  If empty, only .hg/hgrc of
    current repository is read.

    For each element in path, if a directory, all entries in directory
    ending with ".rc" are added to path.  Else, element itself is
    added to path.

HGUSER::
    This is the string used for the author of a commit.

    (deprecated, use .hgrc)

EMAIL::
    If HGUSER is not set, this will be used as the author for a commit.

LOGNAME::
    If neither HGUSER nor EMAIL is set, LOGNAME will be used (with
    '@hostname' appended) as the author value for a commit.

EDITOR::
    This is the name of the editor used in the hgmerge script. It will be
    used for commit messages if HGEDITOR isn't set. Defaults to 'vi'.

PYTHONPATH::
    This is used by Python to find imported modules and may need to be set
    appropriately if Mercurial is not installed system-wide.

FILES
-----
 .hgignore::
    This file contains regular expressions (one per line) that describe file
    names that should be ignored by hg. For details, see hgignore(5).

 .hgtags::
    This file contains changeset hash values and text tag names (one of each
    separated by spaces) that correspond to tagged versions of the repository
    contents.

 /etc/mercurial/hgrc, $HOME/.hgrc, .hg/hgrc::
    This file contains defaults and configuration. Values in .hg/hgrc
    override those in $HOME/.hgrc, and these override settings made in the
    global /etc/mercurial/hgrc configuration.  See hgrc(5) for details of
    the contents and format of these files.

Some commands (e.g. revert) produce backup files ending in .orig, if
the .orig file already exists and is not tracked by Mercurial, it
will be overwritten.

BUGS
----
Probably lots, please post them to the mailing list (See Resources below)
when you find them.

SEE ALSO
--------
hgignore(5), hgrc(5)

AUTHOR
------
Written by Matt Mackall <[e-mail]>

RESOURCES
---------
http://selenic.com/mercurial[Main Web Site]

http://selenic.com/hg[Source code repository]

http://selenic.com/mailman/listinfo/mercurial[Mailing list]

COPYING
-------
Copyright \(C) 2005, 2006 Matt Mackall.
Free use of this software is granted under the terms of the GNU General
Public License (GPL).