a@xxxxxxxx (Christoffer Stjernlöf) writes: > A common use case of git branch – for me – is to use it to test whether > a particular branch satisfies some conditions. A recent example is this: > > if ! git branch "$DEV_BRANCH" --contains master; then This invocation is not in line with how "git branch" subcommand is designed to work. The subcommand operates in various modes (like creating a new one, renaming an existing one, deleting existing one(s)), among which there is a mode to "list existing ones". Without an explicit option on the command line to tell what mode the user wants (e.g. "-d" for deleting), it defaults to the listing mode, "git branch --list". The list mode can limit what is listed via different criteria, one of which is with a pattern that the shown branches must match, e.g. $ git branch --list "cs/*" which shows only the branches whose names begin with "cs/". It can also limit the branches whose tip commits can reach a named commit with the "--contains". $ DEV_BRANCH=cs/topic $ git branch --contains master "$DEV_BRANCH" asks the subcommand to show only the branches that can reach the commit at the tip of 'master', *AND* whose name match cs/topic. So it may show the cs/topic branch (and nothing else, even there are cs/topic1 or cs/topic/2 branches) if and only if that branch can reach the tip of 'master'. If you want to ask "does the tip of $DEV_BRANCH reach commit 'master'?", the right way would probably be to ask if git merge-base --is-ancestor master "$DEV_BRANCH" then echo "master is an ancestor of $DEV_BRANCH" else echo "master has commits not in $DEV_BRANCH" git --no-pager log "master..$DEV_BRANCH" -- fi
