Philip Oakley wrote:

> The problem is the file format, in the sense that the earlier `git cat-file
> commit $orig` has a human readable output which is a description of the
> commit header, rather than the specific binary content.

Ah.  That's the actual "raw" commit object format, though.

The manpage for git-cat-file(1) says:

        SYNOPSIS
                git cat-file (-t | -s | -e | -p | <type> | --textconv ) <object>
                git cat-file (--batch | --batch-check) < <list-of-objects>

        DESCRIPTION
                In its first form, the command provides the content or the
                type of an object in the repository. [...]

        OUTPUT
                ...
                If <type> is specified, the raw (though uncompressed)
                contents of the <object> will be returned.

I agree that this isn't as clear as it should be.  I see a few problems:

 (1) The synopsis treats "git cat-file -t/-s/-e/-p <object>",
     "git cat-file --textconv <tree>:<path>", and
     "git cat-file <type> <object>" as the same form of the command.
     It would be easier to explain these as three different forms.

 (2) There is no EXAMPLES section and no examples.

 (3) There is no pointer to the git object formats.  A pointer to a
     new gitobject(5) manpage would presumably make everything clearer.

https://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/user-manual.html#examining-the-data
might be a good source of text to start from for solving (1), since
it explains the command a little better.

Thanks,
Jonathan
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