jj-util-snapshot(1)

✨ NAME ✨

Hey bestie 🫶 welcome to jj-util-snapshot(1) from the General Commands Manual — this is the page for jj-util-snapshot, aka Snapshot the working copy if needed 💅

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

jj util snapshot [-R|--repository] [--ignore-working-copy]
[--no-integrate-operation] [--ignore-immutable] [--at-operation]
[--debug] [--color] [--quiet] [--no-pager] [--config] [--config-file]
[-h|--help]

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

Okay so jj util snapshot is literally the “snapshot the working copy if needed” command. It snapshots the working copy and updates the working-copy commit if the working copy has changed since the last snapshot. Since almost every command snapshots the working copy, there is very little reason to run this command as a human; it is mostly meant for scripts. Periodt. ✨

If you want to see the ID of the current operation after this command, run jj operation log --limit 1. But plot twist: since that command also snapshots the working copy, there would be no need to run jj util snapshot first. 😭

📸 Example of programmatic snapshotting

Consider the following:

$ echo content > new-file.txt
# At this point, `jj` does not know about `new-file.txt`.
$ ./my-script-that-runs-jj-commands
# Since the script ran `jj` commands, the changes to `new-file.txt` have
# been snapshotted in an operation, which you can see with:
$ jj operation log --patch

If my-script-that-runs-jj-commands has a "sandwich" of jj util snapshot at the beginning and end of the script, then the operation that captures new-file.txt will be distinct from the operations created by the jj commands in that script. In addition, the jj operation log --patch that you ran on the command-line after the script would also have its own operation if needed. However, without jj util snapshot, these operations will be mixed together in the operation log. If this is important to you, then jj util snapshot is useful here to explicitly trigger a snapshot. Clean operation log energy fr fr 💖

🔍 Checking if the operation ID changed

If you want to compare "before and after" operation IDs, it may be better to use jj operation log --no-graph --limit 1 -T id to query for operation information, which you can store in a variable in a script. You can then compare these values as needed to figure out if anything changed during a jj command, such as:

start_op_id="$(jj op log -G -n 1 -T id)"
jj git fetch || exit
fetch_op_id="$(jj op log -G -n 1 -T id)"
if [[ "${start_op_id}" == "${fetch_op_id}" ]]; then
  # Nothing was fetched.
  exit 0
fi
jj rebase -r 'mutable()' -o 'trunk()'
rebase_op_id="$(jj op log -G -n 1 -T id)"
if [[ "${fetch_op_id}" == "${rebase_op_id}" ]]; then
  # Nothing was rebased.
  exit 0
fi
echo "Fetched and rebased!"

Note that jj util snapshot does not output an operation ID, so it is not suitable for checks such as these. Important caveat, bestie. 💅

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💅 OPTIONS 💅

• -h, --help — Print help (see a summary with '-h'). Iconic little helper.

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👑 GLOBAL OPTIONS 👑

• -R, --repository <REPOSITORY> — Path to repository to operate on. By default, Jujutsu searches for the closest .jj/ directory in an ancestor of the current working directory.
• --ignore-working-copy — Don't snapshot the working copy, and don't update it. By default, Jujutsu snapshots the working copy at the beginning of every command. The working copy is also updated at the end of the command, if the command modified the working-copy commit (@). If you want to avoid snapshotting the working copy and instead see a possibly stale working-copy commit, you can use --ignore-working-copy. This may be useful e.g. in a command prompt, especially if you have another process that commits the working copy. Loading the repository at a specific operation with --at-operation implies --ignore-working-copy.
• --no-integrate-operation — Run the command as usual but don't integrate any operations. When this option is given, the operations will still be created as usual but they will not be integrated to the operation log. The working copy will also not be updated. The command will print the resulting operation ID. You can pass that to e.g. jj --at-op to inspect the resulting repo state, or you can pass it to jj op restore to restore the repo to that state. You can also pass the ID to jj op integrate to integrate the operation. Note that this does not prevent side effects outside the repo. For example, jj git push --no-integrate-operation will still perform the push.
• --ignore-immutable — Allow rewriting immutable commits. By default, Jujutsu prevents rewriting commits in the configured set of immutable commits. This option disables that check and lets you rewrite any commit but the root commit. This option only affects the check. It does not affect the immutable_heads() revset or the immutable template keyword.
• --at-operation <AT_OPERATION> — Operation to load the repo at. By default, Jujutsu loads the repo at the most recent operation, or at the merge of the divergent operations if any. You can use --at-op=<operation ID> to see what the repo looked like at an earlier operation. For example jj --at-op=<operation ID> st will show you what jj st would have shown you when the given operation had just finished. --at-op=@ is pretty much the same as the default except that divergent operations will never be merged. Use jj op log to find the operation ID you want. Any unambiguous prefix of the operation ID is enough. When loading the repo at an earlier operation, the working copy will be ignored, as if --ignore-working-copy had been specified. It is possible to run mutating commands when loading the repo at an earlier operation. Doing that is equivalent to having run concurrent commands starting at the earlier operation. There's rarely a reason to do that, but it is possible.
• --debug — Enable debug logging. For when you want the tea. ☕
• --color <WHEN> — When to colorize output. Possible values:
  • always
  • never
  • debug
  • auto
• --quiet — Silence non-primary command output. For example, jj file list will still list files, but it won't tell you if the working copy was snapshotted or if descendants were rebased. Warnings and errors will still be printed.
• --no-pager — Disable the pager.
• --config <NAME=VALUE> — Additional configuration options (can be repeated). The name should be specified as TOML dotted keys. The value should be specified as a TOML expression. If string value isn't enclosed by any TOML constructs (such as array notation), quotes can be omitted.
• --config-file <PATH> — Additional configuration files (can be repeated).

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💖 footer note: source/version snapshot, page jj-util-snapshot(1), and no date listed — that's the sign-off, bestie 💖