Ubuntu Manpage: gbp-dch - Generate the Debian changelog from git commit messages

NAME

       gbp-dch - Generate the Debian changelog from git commit messages

SYNOPSIS

       gbp dch [--version] [--help] [--verbose] [--color=[auto|on|off]] [--color-scheme=
               COLOR_SCHEME] [--debian-branch= branch_name] [--debian-tag= tag-format]
               [--upstream-branch= branch_name] [--upstream-tag= tag-format] [--ignore-branch]
               [-s commitish | --since= commitish] [[-S | --snapshot] | [-R | --release]] [-N
               version | --new-version= version] [--bpo | --nmu | --qa | --security | --team]
               [--distribution= name] [--force-distribution] [-U level | --urgency= level]
               [--[no-]full] [--[no-]meta] [--meta-closes=bug-close-tags] [--meta-closes-
               bugnum=bug-number-format] [--snapshot-number= expression] [--id-length= number]
               [--git-log= git-log-options] [--[no-]git-author] [--[no-]multimaint]
               [--[no-]multimaint-merge] [--spawn-editor=[always|never|snapshot|release]]
               [--commit-msg= msg-format] [-c | --commit] [--customizations= customization-file]
               [--postedit= COMMAND] [--dch-opt= dch-options]... [--verbose] path1 path2

DESCRIPTION

gbp dch reads git commit messages and generates the Debian changelog from it. It starts at
a given commit specified by the --since option up to the current HEAD. For each commit
found it adds the commit message to the changelog. If --since is not given the commit to
start from is determined by the following rules (first one matches):

1. The start commit is read from the snapshot banner (see below for details)

2. If the topmost version of the debian/changelog is alread tagged. Use the commit the
tag points to as start commit.

3. The last commit that modified debian/changelog is used as start commit.

This is called automatic mode.

If the distribution of the topmost section in debian/changelog is UNRELEASED, the
changelog entries will be inserted into this section. Otherwise a new section will be
created.

If one ore more paths are given as arguments gbp dch will only include changes in
debian/changelog that affect these paths. E.g. using debian/ is a good choice if upstream
uses Git and you don't want the upstream history to end up in debian/changelog.

To restrict the selected changes even further you can use use the --git-log option which
is passed on verbatim to git log. E.g. by using --git-log="--author=Foo Bar".

The above relies on the --debian-branch option pointing to the current branch and
--upstream-branch pointing to the corresponding upstream branch in order to find the right
merge points of these branches. Furthermore gbp dch must be able to identify git tags from
upstream and Debian version numbers. If you're not using the defaults check the
--upstream-tag and --debian-tag options and make sure they match the tags created by e.g.
gbp import-orig (when using tarballs) or upstream's tagging pattern (when using upstream's
git directly).

If not changelog exists yet it is created and the version number is derived from the last
upstream tag if found.

OPTIONS

--version
Print version of the program, i.e. version of the git-buildpackage suite

-v, --verbose
Verbose execution

-h, --help
Print help and exit

--color=[auto|on|off]
Whether to use colored output.

--color-scheme=COLOR_SCHEME
Colors to use in output (when color is enabled). The format for COLOR_SCHEME is
'<debug>:<info>:<warning>:<error>'. Numerical values and color names are accepted,
empty fields imply the default color. For example, --git-color-scheme='cyan:34::'
would show debug messages in cyan, info messages in blue and other messages in
default (i.e. warning and error messages in red).

--debian-branch=branch_name
The branch in the Git repository the Debian package is being developed on, default
is master.

--upstream-branch=branch_name
Branch to determine the upstream version from. Default is upstream.

--git-upstream-tag=TAG-FORMAT
Use this tag format when looking for tags of upstream versions, default is
upstream/%(version)s.

--ignore-branch
Don't check if the current branch matches debian-branch.

--debian-tag=tag-format
Tag format used, when tagging debian versions, default is debian/%(version)s

--since=committish
Start reading commit messages at committish. This option can't be set via
gbp.conf.

--auto, -a
This option is ignored for compatibility with older versions. It used to trigger
automatic mode.

--[no-]meta
Parse meta tags like Closes:, Thanks: and Gbp-Dch:. See META TAGS below.

--meta-closes=bug-close-tags
What meta tags to look for to generate bug-closing changelog entries. The default
is 'Closes|LP' to support Debian and Launchpad.

--meta-closes-bugnum=bug-number-format
What regular expression should be used to parse out the bug number. The default is
'(?:bug|issue)?\#?\s?\d+'. Note: the regex should suppress all portions of the bug
number that are not wanted using "(?:)", see Python regex manual for details.

Example: --meta-closes-bugnum="(?:bug)?\s*ex-\d+" would match all of the following:

Possible Txt Match? Result
------------ ------ ------
bug EX-12345 Y EX-12345
ex-01273 Y ex-01273
bug ex-1ab Y ex-1
EX--12345 N

--[no-]full
Include the full commit message in the changelog output.

--snapshot, -S
Create a snapshot release entry. It uses a snapshot release number which is smaller
than the final release number and adds a warning banner to the changelog entry. The
version number is being auto incremented with every new snapshot release.

The snapshot banner is also used by gbp dch to determine which entries are already
in the changelog. This prevents duplicated entries in debian/changelog when you did
not commit the changelog yet.

--snapshot-number=expression
Python expression that gets eval()ed to the new snapshot number.

--release, -R
Remove any snapshot release banners and version suffixes (if any), set the current
distribution to unstable, and open the changelog for final tweaking. This option
can't be set via gbp.conf. It's usually used to finalize the changelog before
making a release.

--new-version=version, -N version
Add a new changelog section with version newversion. Together with --snapshot, the
snapshot number will be appended to newversion. This option can't be set via
gbp.conf.

--team Create a Team upload changelog entry. This option can't be set via gbp.conf.

--bpo Increment the Debian release number for an upload to backports, and add a backport
upload changelog comment. This option can't be set via gbp.conf.

--nmu Increment the Debian release number for a non-maintainer upload. This option can't
be set via gbp.conf.

--qa Increment the Debian release number for a Debian QA Team upload, and add a QA
upload changelog comment. This option can't be set via gbp.conf.

--security
Increment the Debian release number for a Debian Security Team non-maintainer
upload, and add a "Security Team upload" changelog comment. This option can't be
set via gbp.conf.

--distribution=name
Set the distribution field to name. This option can't be set via gbp.conf.

--force-distribution
Force the distribution specified with --distribution to be used, even if it doesn't
match the list of known distributions. This option can't be set via gbp.conf.

--urgency=level
Set the urgency field to level.

--git-log=git-log-options
Options passed on verbatim to git-log(1).

--id-length=N
Include N digits of the commit id in the changelog entry. Default is to not include
any commit ids at all.

--ignore-regex=regex
Ignore commit lines matching regex when generating the changelog.

--git-author
Use user.name and user.email from git-config(1) for changelog trailer.

--[no-]multimaint-merge
Merge commits by maintainer.

--spawn-editor=[always|never|snapshot|release]
Whether to spawn an editor: always, never, when doing snapshots or when doing a
release.

--commit-msg=msg-format
Use this format string for the commit message when committing the generated
changelog file (when --commit is given). Default is Update changelog for
%(version)s release

--commit
Commit the generated changelog.

--customizations=customization-file
Load Python code from customization-file. At the moment, the only useful thing the
code can do is define a custom format_changelog_entry() function.

--postedit=COMMAND
RunCOMMAND after changes to the changelog file have been finalized, That is, after
dch has been run and possible text editor has been exited, but, before changes are
(possibly) committed to git.

--dch-opt=dch-option
Pass option to dch verbatim. Note that gbp dch invokes dch multiple times and the
option is passed to all invocations so not all dch options make sense here. Options
may also conflict with options picked by gbp dch.

SNAPSHOT MODE

       Snapshot  mode can be used for quick test and install cycles without having to worry about
       version numbers or changelog entries.

       When using --snapshot or -S, gbp dch uses a pseudo  header  in  the  Debian  changelog  to
       remember the last git commit it added a changelog entry for. It also sets a version number
       ending in ~<snaspshotnumber>.gbp<commitid>.   It  automatically  increments  the  snapshot
       number  on subsequent invocations of gbp dch -S so that later snapshots automatically have
       a higher version number. To leave snapshot mode, invoke gbp dch with the --release option.
       This  removes  the  pseudo header and unmangles the version number so the released version
       has a higher version number than the snapshots.

META TAGS

Additional to the above options, the formatting of the commit message in debian/changelog
can be modified by special tags (called Meta Tags) given in the git commit message. Meta
Tag processing can be activated via the --meta option. The tags must start at the first
column of a commit message but can appear on any line. They are of the form Tagname:
value. Valid Meta Tags are:

Gbp-Dch: action
Supported actions are: Ignore which will ignore this commit when generating
debian/changelog, Short which will only use the description (the first line) of the
commit message when generating the changelog entry (useful when --full is given),
and Full which will use the full commit message when generating the changelog entry
(useful when --full is not given).

In addition to Gbp-Dch, the deprecated Git-Dch is still supported.

Thanks: msg
Add a thanks message after the commit message.

Closes: bugnumber
Indicate in the debian/changelog that the bug was closed by this commit. See the
--meta-closes on how to extend this for other bugtrackers.

The following git commit message:

Document meta tags

so one doesn't have to consult the manual

Gbp-Dch: Short
Closes: #636088
Thanks: Raphaël Hertzog for the suggestion

Results in this debian/changelog entry:

* Document meta tags.
Thanks to Raphaël Hertzog for the suggestion (Closes: #636088)

CONFIGURATION FILES

       Several  gbp.conf  files  are parsed to set defaults for the above command-line arguments.
       See the gbp.conf(5) manpage for details.

AUTHOR

       Guido Günther <agx@sigxcpu.org>

                                           3 April 2018                                gbp-dch(1)