Usage

NAME:
  git-num - Quickly reference files in Git using numbers

USAGE:
  git num [git_cmd [index ...] | convert [index ...] | -h | -v]

EXAMPLES:
  git num                # show `git status` with git-num indexes
  git num add 1-3 5      # call `git add` with files at indexes 1, 2, 3, 5
  git num diff README 2  # call `git diff` with "README" and file at index 2
  git num reset HEAD 4   # call `git reset HEAD` with file at index 4
  git num checkout -- 4  # call `git checkout --` with file at index 4
  git num convert 1-3    # write filenames at indexes 1, 2, 3 to STDOUT
  git num -h             # show this help screen
  git num -v             # show version

Screenshot

git-num works by annotating the output of git status with numbers. (It will maintain whatever color scheme you use.)

Installation

git-num has been tested on OSX and Linux. It requires Git v1.7.9+ and Ruby 1.9.3+.

To install, download the git-num executable, place it in a directory that is on your PATH, and chmod +x git-num. Git will automatically use this executable when you call git num.

Or you may simply execute:

LATEST_RELEASE_URL=$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/schreifels/git-num/releases | grep browser_download_url | head -n 1 | cut -d '"' -f 4)
DESTINATION_PATH=/usr/local/bin/git-num

curl -L -o $DESTINATION_PATH $LATEST_RELEASE_URL
chmod +x $DESTINATION_PATH
git num -h # should output git-num help screen

Hopefully in the future, git-num will also be available via Homebrew.

If you're having issues, take a look at the troubleshooting guide below.

Customization

It's handy to create an alias for git num:

alias gn="git num"

You can take this a step further if you have aliases for other Git commands, e.g.:

alias ga="git num add"
alias gr="git num reset"
alias gco="git num checkout"
alias gd="git num diff"
alias gds="git num diff --staged"

You can also use git-num in conjunction with non-Git commands, e.g.:

# `ber 2` => execute `bundle exec rspec [file at index 2]`
function ber() { git num convert "$@" | xargs bundle exec rspec; }

# `gnc 2` => copy file at index 2 to Mac clipboard
function gnc() { git num convert "$@" | pbcopy; }

Goal

The goal of this project was to create a lightweight, well-tested Ruby command line utility for referencing files in Git. Unlike other similar projects, git-num supports renamed files, filenames with spaces, and other corner cases.

Troubleshooting

'num' is not a git command.

~/sample-git-project $ git num
git: 'num' is not a git command. See 'git --help'.

This means the git-num executable is not on your PATH. Verify that the file is located inside one of the directories listed in echo $PATH.

Permission denied

~/sample-git-project $ git num
fatal: cannot exec 'git-num': Permission denied

You need to add execute permissions to the script:

chmod +x path/to/git-num

'num' appears to be a git command, but we were not able...

~/sample-git-project $ git num
fatal: 'num' appears to be a git command, but we were not able to execute it.
Maybe git-num is broken?

Type:

git-num

(Notice the hyphen.) This will execute the script directly rather than using git to execute it. You should see the actual error printed out. You will probably see something like:

bash: /usr/local/bin/git-num: /usr/bin/ruby: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

which means you do not have Ruby installed at /usr/bin/ruby. First, verify that you have Ruby installed. If you do, change the first line of git-num to be #!/usr/bin/env ruby (or the correct direct path).

This is not the default because Ruby version managers hijack #!/usr/bin/env ruby and can be considerably slower than using the system Ruby directly.