Documentation: 'git add -A' can remove files

The current documentation fails to mention that 'git add -A/--all' can remove files as well as add them, and it also does not say anything about filepatterns (whether they are allowed, mandatory, or optional). It is also not clear what the similarities and differences to the -u option are. Update the intro paragraph (as suggested by Junio, with some minor edits) to make it clear that 'git add' is able to delete and to also cover the -p option. Reword the description of -u to make it clearer (based on Björn Steinbrink's suggestion). Simplify the description of -A by saying "Like -u" and then describe the differences (based on the suggestions by Björn Steinbrink and Junio). Signed-off-by: Björn Gustavsson <bgustavsson@gmail.com> Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

Björn Gustavsson committed Dec 7, 2009 at 09:20 UTC 968d70723ae1e352bde2f7171d18484186838d9f

1 file changed +20 -13

Documentation/git-add.txt

+20 -13

@@ -14,8 +14,12 @@ SYNOPSIS

15 DESCRIPTION

16 -----------

17 -This command adds the current content of new or modified files to the

18 -index, thus staging that content for inclusion in the next commit.

17 +This command updates the index using the current content found in

18 +the working tree, to prepare the content staged for the next commit.

19 +It typically adds the current content of existing paths as a whole,

20 +but with some options it can also be used to add content with

21 +only part of the changes made to the working tree files applied, or

22 +remove paths that do not exist in the working tree anymore.

24 The "index" holds a snapshot of the content of the working tree, and it

25 is this snapshot that is taken as the contents of the next commit. Thus

@@ -92,20 +96,23 @@ apply.

97 -u::

98 --update::

95 - Update only files that git already knows about, staging modified

96 - content for commit and marking deleted files for removal. This

97 - is similar

98 - to what "git commit -a" does in preparation for making a commit,

99 - except that the update is limited to paths specified on the

100 - command line. If no paths are specified, all tracked files in the

101 - current directory and its subdirectories are updated.

99 + Only match <filepattern> against already tracked files in

100 + the index rather than the working tree. That means that it

101 + will never stage new files, but that it will stage modified

102 + new contents of tracked files and that it will remove files

103 + from the index if the corresponding files in the working tree

104 + have been removed.

105 ++

106 +If no <filepattern> is given, default to "."; in other words,

107 +update all tracked files in the current directory and its

108 +subdirectories.

109

110 -A::

111 --all::

105 - Update files that git already knows about (same as '\--update')

106 - and add all untracked files that are not ignored by '.gitignore'

107 - mechanism.

108 -

112 + Like `-u`, but match <filepattern> against files in the

113 + working tree in addition to the index. That means that it

114 + will find new files as well as staging modified content and

115 + removing files that are no longer in the working tree.

116

117 -N::

118 --intent-to-add::