Is it possible to open a file in a git branch without checking out that branch? How?
Essentially I want to be able to open a file in my github pages branch without switching branches all the time. I don't want to modify it, just want to view it.
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Gilles 'SO- stop being evil'
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Schneems
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16All the answers missed the fact you need to specify the full path of the file with `git show`: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/610208/how-to-retrieve-a-single-file-from-specific-revision-in-git/610315#610315 and http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2364147/how-to-get-just-one-file-from-another-branch/2364223#2364223 – VonC Oct 21 '11 at 23:53
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18These days, you can use `git show a1b35:./file.txt` to use relative paths. – Steve Bennett Aug 12 '13 at 04:57
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2@VonC - thank goodness for branch-aware tab completion :) – Luke May 18 '17 at 11:00
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more interesting could be showing differences `git diff
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The relative file example above with "a1b35", that is the branch name -- so of course put your own branch name there. – loneRanger Mar 09 '20 at 16:02
5 Answers
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This should work:
git show branch:file
Where branch can be any ref (branch, tag, HEAD, ...) and file is the full path of the file. To export it you could use
git show branch:file > exported_file
You should also look at VonC's answers to some related questions:
- How to retrieve a single file from specific revision in Git?
- How to get just one file from another branch
UPDATE 2015-01-19:
Nowadays you can use relative paths with git show a1b35:./file.txt.
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28And you can pop the file open in vim as well: `git show branch:file | vim -` (Notice the "|" pipe, and the trailing dash after the vim command: `vim -` – Greg Burghardt Jul 16 '14 at 20:42
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@GregBurghardt: That's cool. It would be cooler if I can somehow give vim a hint about how to highlight the content – GuLearn Jul 25 '14 at 20:41
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I think if you do `vim -c "set syntax on" -` that should turn syntax highlighting on. Haven't tried it yet. – Greg Burghardt Jul 26 '14 at 00:43
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3@GregBurghardt what works for me is something similar to `vim -c "set syntax=html" -` – raphaëλ Nov 13 '14 at 10:54
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@rparree vim guesses the correct syntax from the file suffix. You can avoid this by adding a vim modline as a comment to your files. That way you can also set more file-specific settings, i.e. indentation etc. http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Modeline_magic – gschenk Apr 14 '16 at 04:00
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After piping into vim just press the colon key and type `set syntax=python` or whatever :) – rjh Apr 23 '16 at 11:52
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2This ONLY shows local branches, it does NOT show all branches on server – William Entriken Feb 16 '17 at 19:58
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3@FullDecent, I was able to use ```origin/my_remote_branch``` fine with this. Or do you mean the actual server version? If you want that, you just need to ```git fetch``` first. – rsmith54 Jan 25 '18 at 20:20
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if you are in Vim, you can do `%!git show
:%` that will open the git show result in a buffer, – Renan Cidale Apr 13 '21 at 08:56
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git show somebranch:path/to/your/file
you can also do multiple files and have them concatenated:
git show branchA~10:fileA branchB^^:fileB
You do not have to provide the full path to the file, relative paths are acceptable e.g.:
git show branchA~10:../src/hello.c
If you want to get the file in the local directory (revert just one file) you can checkout:
git checkout somebranch^^^ -- path/to/file
Stabledog
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Adam Dymitruk
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For Windows users: This is one of the few places where git bash for Windows doesn't know to normalise case and path separators. i.e. You must match the case exactly and use `/` instead of `\ ` - even though cmd's completion will try to tell you the opposite. – pullmyteeth Feb 03 '21 at 21:45
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A simple, newbie friendly way for looking into a file:
git gui browser <branch> which lets you explore the contents of any file.
It's also there in the File menu of git gui. Most other -more advanced- GUI wrappers (Qgit, Egit, etc..) offer browsing/opening files as well.
inger
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1This command results "git: 'gui' is not a git command. See 'git --help'. I'm a newbie; what's going on? – SMBiggs Nov 06 '15 at 14:42
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3It actually works (to my surprise), see https://git-scm.com/docs/git-gui - I use git version 2.5.2.windows.1 – anhoppe Jul 04 '16 at 14:27
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This answer was very helpful! Thanks. Should mention that im using git bash on windows. – merger Mar 09 '17 at 13:11
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Only drawback is, you have to close the git gui browser (file viewer) in order to use the command line (git bash) again. I suspect that opening a new (git bash) window, would get around this restriction. – SherylHohman Mar 18 '20 at 06:04
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@Blubber you need to do it from the root directory, where the main .git is present – alinsoar Jul 21 '20 at 09:23
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If you're using Emacs, you can type C-x v ~ or M-x vc-revision-other-window to see a different revision of the file you're currently editing (tags, branches and hashes all work).
legoscia
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Add the following to your ~/.gitconfig file
[alias]
cat = "!git show \"$1:$2\" #"
And then try this
git cat BRANCHNAME FILEPATH
Personally I prefer separate parameters without a colon. Why? This choice mirrors the parameters of the checkout command, which I tend to use rather frequently and I find it thus much easier to remember than the bizarro colon-separated parameter of the show command.
akuhn
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1**Bash completions** works with git aliases immediately after `.git/config` was saved, e.g. save config and try `git cat ma[tab-tab] docke[tab-tab]`. Thx, @akuhn – viktorkho Jul 01 '20 at 07:29