Why I really like Tig for visualizing my Git workflows

If you discover navigating your Git repositories frustratingly advanced, have I received the instrument for you. Meet Tig.

Tig is an ncurses-based text-mode interface for Git that means that you can browse modifications in a Git repository. It additionally acts as a pager for the output of assorted Git instructions. I exploit this instrument to offer me a good suggestion of what’s been modified by which commit by whom, the most recent commit merged, and a lot extra. Try it for your self, beginning with this temporary tutorial.

Installing Tig

On Linux, you possibly can set up Tig utilizing your package deal supervisor. For occasion, on Fedora and Mageia:

$ sudo dnf set up tig

On Debian, Linux Mint, Elementary, Pop_OS, and different Debian-based distributions:

$ sud apt set up tig

On macOS, use MacPorts or Homebrew. Tig’s full set up information will be discovered within the Tig Manual.

Using Tig

Tig supplies an interactive view of widespread Git output. For occasion, with Git you possibly can view all refs with the command git show-ref:

$ git show-ref

98b108... refs/heads/grasp

6dae95... refs/remotes/origin/1010-internal-share-partition-format-reflexion

84e1f8... refs/remotes/origin/1015-add-libretro-openlara

e62c7c... refs/remotes/origin/1016-add-support-for-retroarch-project-cd

1c29a8... refs/remotes/origin/1066-add-libretro-mess

ffd3f53... refs/remotes/origin/1155-automatically-generate-assets-for-external-installers

ab4d14... refs/remotes/origin/1160-release-on-bare-metal-servers

28baa9... refs/remotes/origin/1180-ipega-pg-9118

8dff1d... refs/remotes/origin/1181-add-libretro-dosbox-core-s

81a7fe... refs/remotes/origin/1189-allow-manual-build-on-master

[...]

With Tig, you may get that data and way more in a scrollable listing, plus keyboard shortcuts to open extra views with particulars about every ref.

Pager mode

Tig enters pager mode when enter is offered to stdin (commonplace enter). When the present subcommand is specified and the --stdin choice is given, stdin is assumed to be an inventory of commit IDs, which is forwarded to git-show:

$ git rev-list --author=sumantrom HEAD | tig present –stdin

Log and diff views

When you are in Tig’s log view, you possibly can press the d key in your keyboard to show diffs. This shows the information modified within the commit and the traces that have been eliminated and added.

Interactive Git information

Tig is a superb addition to Git. It makes it straightforward to evaluation your Git repository by encouraging you to discover the logs with out having to assemble lengthy and generally advanced queries.

Add Tig to your Git toolkit at the moment!