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authorJonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>2010-01-23 03:42:46 -0600
committerThomas Rast <trast@student.ethz.ch>2010-01-24 13:57:42 +0100
commitb40bb374a618534b930ce4da5ffffb215b5cb488 (patch)
tree30959fdf1e176374bf7d24aee9c3f273e14334df /Documentation/git-merge.txt
parenta4081bacfc78c1e1843590ed8d87544f3873dd10 (diff)
downloadgit-b40bb374a618534b930ce4da5ffffb215b5cb488.tar.gz
Documentation: merge: add an overview
The reader unfamiliar with the concepts of branching and merging would have been completely lost. Try to help him with a diagram. Signed-off-by: Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> Signed-off-by: Thomas Rast <trast@student.ethz.ch>
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diff --git a/Documentation/git-merge.txt b/Documentation/git-merge.txt
index 83bf3e783f..e3c611dd0e 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-merge.txt
+++ b/Documentation/git-merge.txt
@@ -15,8 +15,32 @@ SYNOPSIS
DESCRIPTION
-----------
-Merges the history specified by <commit> into HEAD, optionally using a
-specific merge strategy.
+Incorporates changes from the named commits (since the time their
+histories diverged from the current branch) into the current
+branch. This command is used by 'git pull' to incorporate changes
+from another repository and can be used by hand to merge changes
+from one branch into another.
+
+Assume the following history exists and the current branch is
+"`master`":
+
+------------
+ A---B---C topic
+ /
+ D---E---F---G master
+------------
+
+Then "`git merge topic`" will replay the changes made on the
+`topic` branch since it diverged from `master` (i.e., `E`) until
+its current commit (`C`) on top of `master`, and record the result
+in a new commit along with the names of the two parent commits and
+a log message from the user describing the changes.
+
+------------
+ A---B---C topic
+ / \
+ D---E---F---G---H master
+------------
The second syntax (<msg> `HEAD` <commit>...) is supported for
historical reasons. Do not use it from the command line or in