Get the current git hash in a Python script

No need to hack around getting data from the git command yourself. GitPython is a very nice way to do this and a lot of other git stuff. It even has "best effort" support for Windows.

After pip install gitpython you can do

import git
repo = git.Repo(search_parent_directories=True)
sha = repo.head.object.hexsha

Something to consider when using this library. The following is taken from gitpython.readthedocs.io

Leakage of System Resources

GitPython is not suited for long-running processes (like daemons) as it tends to leak system resources. It was written in a time where destructors (as implemented in the __del__ method) still ran deterministically.

In case you still want to use it in such a context, you will want to search the codebase for __del__ implementations and call these yourself when you see fit.

Another way assure proper cleanup of resources is to factor out GitPython into a separate process which can be dropped periodically

This post contains the command, Greg's answer contains the subprocess command.

import subprocess

def get_git_revision_hash() -> str:
    return subprocess.check_output(['git', 'rev-parse', 'HEAD']).decode('ascii').strip()

def get_git_revision_short_hash() -> str:
    return subprocess.check_output(['git', 'rev-parse', '--short', 'HEAD']).decode('ascii').strip()

when running

print(get_git_revision_hash())
print(get_git_revision_short_hash())

you get output:

fd1cd173fc834f62fa7db3034efc5b8e0f3b43fe
fd1cd17

Here's a more complete version of Greg's answer:

import subprocess
print(subprocess.check_output(["git", "describe", "--always"]).strip().decode())

Or, if the script is being called from outside the repo:

import subprocess, os
print(subprocess.check_output(["git", "describe", "--always"], cwd=os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))).strip().decode())

Or, if the script is being called from outside the repo and you like pathlib:

import subprocess
from pathlib import Path
print(subprocess.check_output(["git", "describe", "--always"], cwd=Path(__file__).resolve().parent).strip().decode())

If subprocess isn't portable and you don't want to install a package to do something this simple you can also do this.

import pathlib

def get_git_revision(base_path):
    git_dir = pathlib.Path(base_path) / '.git'
    with (git_dir / 'HEAD').open('r') as head:
        ref = head.readline().split(' ')[-1].strip()

    with (git_dir / ref).open('r') as git_hash:
        return git_hash.readline().strip()

I've only tested this on my repos but it seems to work pretty consistantly.

numpy has a nice looking multi-platform routine in its setup.py:

import os
import subprocess

# Return the git revision as a string
def git_version():
    def _minimal_ext_cmd(cmd):
        # construct minimal environment
        env = {}
        for k in ['SYSTEMROOT', 'PATH']:
            v = os.environ.get(k)
            if v is not None:
                env[k] = v
        # LANGUAGE is used on win32
        env['LANGUAGE'] = 'C'
        env['LANG'] = 'C'
        env['LC_ALL'] = 'C'
        out = subprocess.Popen(cmd, stdout = subprocess.PIPE, env=env).communicate()[0]
        return out

    try:
        out = _minimal_ext_cmd(['git', 'rev-parse', 'HEAD'])
        GIT_REVISION = out.strip().decode('ascii')
    except OSError:
        GIT_REVISION = "Unknown"

    return GIT_REVISION

This is an improvement of Yuji 'Tomita' Tomita answer.

import subprocess

def get_git_revision_hash():
    full_hash = subprocess.check_output(['git', 'rev-parse', 'HEAD'])
    full_hash = str(full_hash, "utf-8").strip()
    return full_hash

def get_git_revision_short_hash():
    short_hash = subprocess.check_output(['git', 'rev-parse', '--short', 'HEAD'])
    short_hash = str(short_hash, "utf-8").strip()
    return short_hash

print(get_git_revision_hash())
print(get_git_revision_short_hash())

if you want a bit more data than the hash, you can use git-log:

import subprocess

def get_git_hash():
    return subprocess.check_output(['git', 'log', '-n', '1', '--pretty=tformat:%H']).strip()

def get_git_short_hash():
    return subprocess.check_output(['git', 'log', '-n', '1', '--pretty=tformat:%h']).strip()

def get_git_short_hash_and_commit_date():
    return subprocess.check_output(['git', 'log', '-n', '1', '--pretty=tformat:%h-%ad', '--date=short']).strip()

for full list of formating options - check out git log --help

I ran across this problem and solved it by implementing this function. https://gist.github.com/NaelsonDouglas/9bc3bfa26deec7827cb87816cad88d59

from pathlib import Path

def get_commit(repo_path):
    git_folder = Path(repo_path,'.git')
    head_name = Path(git_folder, 'HEAD').read_text().split('\n')[0].split(' ')[-1]
    head_ref = Path(git_folder,head_name)
    commit = head_ref.read_text().replace('\n','')
    return commit


r = get_commit('PATH OF YOUR CLONED REPOSITORY')
print(r)

I had a problem similar to the OP, but in my case I'm delivering the source code to my client as a zip file and, although I know they will have python installed, I cannot assume they will have git. Since the OP didn't specify his operating system and if he has git installed, I think I can contribute here.

To get only the hash of the commit, Naelson Douglas's answer was perfect, but to have the tag name, I'm using the dulwich python package. It's a simplified git client in python.

After installing the package with pip install dulwich --global-option="--pure" one can do:

from dulwich import porcelain

def get_git_revision(base_path):
    return porcelain.describe(base_path)

r = get_git_revision("PATH OF YOUR REPOSITORY's ROOT FOLDER")
print(r)

I've just run this code in one repository here and it showed the output v0.1.2-1-gfb41223, similar to what is returned by git describe, meaning that I'm 1 commit after the tag v0.1.2 and the 7-digit hash of the commit is fb41223.

It has some limitations: currently it doesn't have an option to show if a repository is dirty and it always shows a 7-digit hash, but there's no need to have git installed, so one can choose the trade-off.

Edit: in case of errors in the command pip install due to the option --pure (the issue is explained here), pick one of the two possible solutions:

1. Install Dulwich package's dependencies first: pip install urllib3 certifi && pip install dulwich --global-option="--pure"
2. Install without the option pure: pip install dulwich. This will install some platform dependent files in your system, but it will improve the package's performance.

If you don't have Git available for some reason, but you have the git repo (.git folder is found), you can fetch the commit hash from .git/fetch/heads/[branch].

For example, I've used a following quick-and-dirty Python snippet run at the repository root to get the commit id:

git_head = '.git\\HEAD'

# Open .git\HEAD file:
with open(git_head, 'r') as git_head_file:
    # Contains e.g. ref: ref/heads/master if on "master"
    git_head_data = str(git_head_file.read())

# Open the correct file in .git\ref\heads\[branch]
git_head_ref = '.git\\%s' % git_head_data.split(' ')[1].replace('/', '\\').strip()

# Get the commit hash ([:7] used to get "--short")
with open(git_head_ref, 'r') as git_head_ref_file:
    commit_id = git_head_ref_file.read().strip()[:7]

If you are like me :

• Multiplatform so subprocess may crash one day
• Using Python 2.7 so GitPython not available
• Don't want to use Numpy just for that
• Already using Sentry (old depreciated version : raven)

Then (this will not work on shell because shell doesn't detect current file path, replace BASE_DIR by your current file path) :

import os
import raven

BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))
print(raven.fetch_git_sha(BASE_DIR))

That's it.

I was looking for another solution because I wanted to migrate to sentry_sdk and leave raven but maybe some of you want to continue using raven for a while.

Here was the discussion that get me into this stackoverflow issue

So using the code of raven without raven is also possible (see discussion) :

from __future__ import absolute_import

import os.path

__all__ = 'fetch_git_sha'


def fetch_git_sha(path, head=None):
    """
    >>> fetch_git_sha(os.path.dirname(__file__))
    """
    if not head:
        head_path = os.path.join(path, '.git', 'HEAD')

        with open(head_path, 'r') as fp:
            head = fp.read().strip()

        if head.startswith('ref: '):
            head = head[5:]
            revision_file = os.path.join(
                path, '.git', *head.split('/')
            )
        else:
            return head
    else:
        revision_file = os.path.join(path, '.git', 'refs', 'heads', head)

    if not os.path.exists(revision_file):
        # Check for Raven .git/packed-refs' file since a `git gc` may have run
        # https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Internals-Maintenance-and-Data-Recovery
        packed_file = os.path.join(path, '.git', 'packed-refs')
        if os.path.exists(packed_file):
            with open(packed_file) as fh:
                for line in fh:
                    line = line.rstrip()
                    if line and line[:1] not in ('#', '^'):
                        try:
                            revision, ref = line.split(' ', 1)
                        except ValueError:
                            continue
                        if ref == head:
                            return revision

    with open(revision_file) as fh:
        return fh.read().strip()

I named this file versioning.py and I import "fetch_git_sha" where I need it passing file path as argument.

Hope it will help some of you ;)

Try

open(".git/refs/heads/master", "r").read()