Export git log to variable as multiline string

Question

When I execute this command

 git log 23237d...1a8815 --oneline --pretty=tformat:"%h %B"

I get something like

1a88151 commit1

8a544c0 commit2

b168aa9 commit3

But when I want to export this to some variable:

export LOG=`git log 23237d...1a8815 --oneline --pretty=tformat:"%h %B"`

And output it: echo $LOG, I get this:

1a88151 commit1 8a544c0 commit2 b168aa9 commit3

How can I make multiline export?

Colin D Bennett · Accepted Answer · 2019-02-14 16:39:29Z

9

You need to quote the expansion of the LOG variable in the call to echo:

echo "$LOG"

This prevents word splitting from taking place. You don't need to modify the IFS variable in this case.

answered Feb 14, 2019 at 16:39

Colin D Bennett

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match · Accepted Answer · 2019-02-14 10:24:39Z

6

Bash processes the input using the contents of the IFS variable. From the docs:

The Internal Field Separator (IFS) that is used for word splitting after expansion and to split lines into words with the read builtin command. The default value is <space><tab><newline>.

You can change the values of IFS to alter the behaviour:

IFS='' export LOG=`git log 23237d...1a8815 --oneline --pretty=tformat:"%h %B"`

answered Feb 14, 2019 at 10:24

match

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2 Comments

Colin D Bennett Over a year ago

The problem with this solution, setting IFS to the empty string, is that it's misleading. The IFS='' doesn't affect the line that calls 'git log' and stores it in the LOG variable, but instead IFS='' affects the echo $LOG line, and also persists for the rest of the shell session, with weird an unexpected effects.

Colin D Bennett Over a year ago

Try the following in your shell and note which ones display y y y and which ones preserve the newlines and output three lines of y: (1) IFS=''; LOG=`yes | head -n3`; unset IFS; echo $LOG (2) unset IFS; LOG=`yes | head -n3`; IFS=''; echo $LOG (3) unset IFS; LOG=`yes | head -n3` ; echo "$LOG"

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