From: Jay Soffian <jaysoffian@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 6 Jun 2010 23:31:34 +0000 (-0400)
Subject: commit.txt: clarify how --author argument is used
X-Git-Tag: v1.7.2-rc0~3^2~4
X-Git-Url: http://git.tremily.us/?a=commitdiff_plain;h=3334729cf29605389b51effc1f311656f3fd8086;p=git.git

commit.txt: clarify how --author argument is used

commit --author was added by 146ea06 (git commit --author=$name: look $name up
in existing commits), but its documentation was sorely lacking compared to its
excellent commit message. This commit tries to improve the documentation.

Signed-off-by: Jay Soffian <jaysoffian@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
---

diff --git a/Documentation/git-commit.txt b/Documentation/git-commit.txt
index 64fb458b4..69eb86e45 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-commit.txt
+++ b/Documentation/git-commit.txt
@@ -95,10 +95,11 @@ OPTIONS
 	read the message from the standard input.
 
 --author=<author>::
-	Override the author name used in the commit.  You can use the
-	standard `A U Thor <author@example.com>` format.  Otherwise,
-	an existing commit that matches the given string and its author
-	name is used.
+	Override the commit author. Specify an explicit author using the
+	standard `A U Thor <author@example.com>` format. Otherwise <author>
+	is assumed to be a pattern and is used to search for an existing
+	commit by that author (i.e. rev-list --all -i --author=<author>);
+	the commit author is then copied from the first such commit found.
 
 --date=<date>::
 	Override the author date used in the commit.