Search in git

Here’s a useful trio to know about to help you search things in git:

1. git show <commit>
2. git log --grep='<regexp>'
3. git grep '<regexp>' [commit]

1. git show <commit>

Show a specific commit and it’s diff:

git show
# shows the latest commit
git show <commit>
# shows an specific <commit>
git show v1.2
# shows commit tagged with v1.2

2. git log --grep='<regexp>'

Search through the commit messages:

git log --grep='refactor'

3. git grep '<regexp>' [commit]

Search content in git history:

git grep 'TODO'
# search the repository for the "TODO" string
git grep 'TODO' $(git rev-list --all)
# search the whole history for "TODO" string

And if you find an occurrence of the regexp in a specific commit and you want to browse the repository in that point in time, you can use git checkout for that.