jj/docs/config.md

Configuration

These are the config settings available to jj/Jujutsu.

Config files and TOML

The config settings are loaded from the following locations. Less common ways to specify jj config settings are discussed in a later section.

• The user config file
• .jj/repo/config.toml (per-repository)

See the TOML site and the syntax guide for a description of the syntax.

The first thing to remember is that the value of a setting (the part to the right of the = sign) should be surrounded in quotes if it's a string.

Dotted style and headings

In TOML, anything under a heading can be dotted instead. For example, user.name = "YOUR NAME" is equivalent to:

[user]
name = "YOUR NAME"

For future reference, here are a couple of more complicated examples,

# Dotted style
template-aliases."format_short_id(id)" = "id.shortest(12)"
colors."commit_id prefix".bold = true

# is equivalent to:
[template-aliases]
"format_short_id(id)" = "id.shortest(12)"

[colors]
"commit_id prefix" = { bold = true }

Jujutsu favors the dotted style in these instructions, if only because it's easier to write down in an unconfusing way. If you are confident with TOML then use whichever suits you in your config. If you mix dotted keys and headings, put the dotted keys before the first heading.

That's probably enough TOML to keep you out of trouble but the syntax guide is very short if you ever need to check.

User settings

user.name = "YOUR NAME"
user.email = "YOUR_EMAIL@example.com"

Don't forget to change these to your own details!

UI settings

Colorizing output

Possible values are always, never and auto (default: auto). auto will use color only when writing to a terminal.

This setting overrides the NO_COLOR environment variable (if set).

ui.color = "never" # Turn off color

Custom colors and styles

You can customize the colors used for various elements of the UI. For example:

colors.commit_id = "green"

The following colors are available:

• black
• red
• green
• yellow
• blue
• magenta
• cyan
• white
• default

All of them but "default" come in a bright version too, e.g. "bright red". The "default" color can be used to override a color defined by a parent style (explained below).

If you use a string value for a color, as in the example above, it will be used for the foreground color. You can also set the background color, or make the text bold or underlined. For that, you need to use a table:

colors.commit_id = { fg = "green", bg = "red", bold = true, underline = true }

The key names are called "labels". The above used commit_id as label. You can also create rules combining multiple labels. The rules work a bit like CSS selectors. For example, if you want to color commit IDs green in general but make the commit ID of the working-copy commit also be underlined, you can do this:

colors.commit_id = "green"
colors."working_copy commit_id" = { underline = true }

Parts of the style that are not overridden - such as the foreground color in the example above - are inherited from the parent style.

Which elements can be colored is not yet documented, but see the default color configuration for some examples of what's possible.

Default command

When jj is run with no explicit subcommand, the value of the ui.default-command setting will be used instead. Possible values are any valid subcommand name, subcommand alias, or user-defined alias (defaults to "log").

ui.default-command = "log"

Default description

The value of the ui.default-description setting will be used to prepopulate the editor when describing changes with an empty description. This could be a useful reminder to fill in things like BUG=, TESTED= etc.

ui.default-description = "\n\nTESTED=TODO"

Diff format

# Possible values: "color-words" (default), "git", "summary"
ui.diff.format = "git"

Generating diffs by external command

If ui.diff.tool is set, the specified diff command will be called instead of the internal diff function.

# Use Difftastic by default
ui.diff.tool = ["difft", "--color=always", "$left", "$right"]
# Use tool named "<name>" (see below)
ui.diff.tool = "<name>"

The external diff tool can also be enabled by diff --tool <name> argument. For the tool named <name>, command arguments can be configured as follows.

[merge-tools.<name>]
# program = "<name>"  # Defaults to the name of the tool if not specified
diff-args = ["--color=always", "$left", "$right"]

• $left and $right are replaced with the paths to the left and right directories to diff respectively.

Default revisions to log

You can configure the revisions jj log without -r should show.

# Show commits that are not in `main`
revsets.log = "main.."

Graph style

# Possible values: "curved" (default), "square", "ascii", "ascii-large",
# "legacy"
ui.graph.style = "square"

Wrap log content

If enabled, log/obslog/op log content will be wrapped based on the terminal width.

ui.log-word-wrap = true

Display of commit and change ids

Can be customized by the format_short_id() template alias.

[template-aliases]
# Highlight unique prefix and show at least 12 characters (default)
'format_short_id(id)' = 'id.shortest(12)'
# Just the shortest possible unique prefix
'format_short_id(id)' = 'id.shortest()'
# Show unique prefix and the rest surrounded by brackets
'format_short_id(id)' = 'id.shortest(12).prefix() ++ "[" ++ id.shortest(12).rest() ++ "]"'
# Always show 12 characters
'format_short_id(id)' = 'id.short(12)'

To customize these separately, use the format_short_commit_id() and format_short_change_id() aliases:

[template-aliases]
# Uppercase change ids. `jj` treats change and commit ids as case-insensitive.
'format_short_change_id(id)' = 'format_short_id(id).upper()'

To get shorter prefixes for certain revisions, set revsets.short-prefixes:

# Prioritize the current branch
revsets.short-prefixes = "(main..@):"

Relative timestamps

Can be customized by the format_timestamp() template alias.

[template-aliases]
# Full timestamp in ISO 8601 format (default)
'format_timestamp(timestamp)' = 'timestamp'
# Relative timestamp rendered as "x days/hours/seconds ago"
'format_timestamp(timestamp)' = 'timestamp.ago()'

jj op log defaults to relative timestamps. To use absolute timestamps, you will need to modify the format_time_range() template alias.

[template-aliases]
'format_time_range(time_range)' = 'time_range.start() ++ " - " ++ time_range.end()'

Author format

Can be customized by the format_short_signature() template alias.

[template-aliases]
# Full email address (default)
'format_short_signature(signature)' = 'signature.email()'
# Both name and email address
'format_short_signature(signature)' = 'signature'
# Username part of the email address
'format_short_signature(signature)' = 'signature.username()'

Pager

Windows users: Note that pagination is disabled by default on Windows for now (#2040).

The default pager is can be set via ui.pager or the PAGER environment variable. The priority is as follows (environment variables are marked with a $):

ui.pager > $PAGER

less -FRX is the default pager in the absence of any other setting.

Additionally, paging behavior can be toggled via ui.paginate like so:

# Enable pagination for commands that support it (default)
ui.paginate = "auto"
# Disable all pagination, equivalent to using --no-pager
ui.paginate = "never"

Processing contents to be paged

If you'd like to pass the output through a formatter e.g. diff-so-fancy before piping it through a pager you must do it using a subshell as, unlike git or hg, the command will be executed directly. For example:

ui.pager = ["sh", "-c", "diff-so-fancy | less -RFX"]

Aliases

You can define aliases for commands, including their arguments. For example:

# `jj l` shows commits on the working-copy commit's (anonymous) branch
# compared to the `main` branch
aliases.l = ["log", "-r", "(main..@): | (main..@)-"]

Editor

The default editor is set via ui.editor, though there are several places to set it. The priority is as follows (environment variables are marked with a $):

$JJ_EDITOR > ui.editor > $VISUAL > $EDITOR

Pico is the default editor (Notepad on Windows) in the absence of any other setting, but you could set it explicitly too.

ui.editor = "pico"

To use NeoVim instead:

ui.editor = "nvim"

For GUI editors you possibly need to use a -w or --wait. Some examples:

ui.editor = "code -w"       # VS Code
ui.editor = "bbedit -w"     # BBEdit
ui.editor = "subl -n -w"    # Sublime Text
ui.editor = "mate -w"       # TextMate
ui.editor = ["C:/Program Files/Notepad++/notepad++.exe",
    "-multiInst", "-notabbar", "-nosession", "-noPlugin"] # Notepad++
ui.editor = "idea --temp-project --wait"   #IntelliJ

Obviously, you would only set one line, don't copy them all in!

Editing diffs

The ui.diff-editor setting affects the tool used for editing diffs (e.g. jj split, jj amend -i). The default is meld.

jj makes the following substitutions:

• $left and $right are replaced with the paths to the left and right directories to diff respectively.

If no arguments are specified, ["$left", "$right"] are set by default.

For example:

# Use merge-tools.kdiff3.edit-args
ui.diff-editor = "kdiff3"
# Specify edit-args inline
ui.diff-editor = ["kdiff3", "--merge", "$left", "$right"]

If ui.diff-editor consists of a single word, e.g. "kdiff3", the arguments will be read from the following config keys.

# merge-tools.kdiff3.program = "kdiff3"      # Defaults to the name of the tool if not specified
merge-tools.kdiff3.edit-args = [
    "--merge", "--cs", "CreateBakFiles=0", "$left", "$right"]

Experimental 3-pane diff editing

The special "meld-3" diff editor sets up Meld to show 3 panes: the sides of the diff on the left and right, and an editing pane in the middle. This allow you to see both sides of the original diff while editing. If you use ui.diff-editor = "meld-3", note that you can still get the 2-pane Meld view using jj diff --tool meld.

To configure other diff editors, you can include $output together with $left and $right in merge-tools.TOOL.edit-args. jj will replace $output with the directory where the diff editor will be expected to put the result of the user's edits. Initially, the contents of $output will be the same as the contents of $right.

Setting up scm-diff-editor

scm-diff-editor is a terminal-based diff editor that is part of the git-branchless suite of tools. It's a good alternative to Meld, especially if you don't have a graphical environment (e.g. when using SSH). To install it:

cargo install --git https://github.com/arxanas/git-branchless scm-record --features scm-diff-editor

Then config it as follows:

ui.diff-editor = ["scm-diff-editor", "--dir-diff", "$left", "$right"]

JJ-INSTRUCTIONS

When editing a diff, jj will include a synthetic file called JJ-INSTRUCTIONS in the diff with instructions on how to edit the diff. Any changes you make to this file will be ignored. To suppress the creation of this file, set ui.diff-instructions = false.

Using Vim as a diff editor

Using ui.diff-editor = "vimdiff" is possible but not recommended. For a better experience, you can follow these instructions to configure the DirDiff Vim plugin and/or the vimtabdiff Python script.

3-way merge tools for conflict resolution

The ui.merge-editor key specifies the tool used for three-way merge tools by jj resolve. For example:

# Use merge-tools.meld.merge-args
ui.merge-editor = "meld"  # Or "kdiff3" or "vimdiff"
# Specify merge-args inline
ui.merge-editor = ["meld", "$left", "$base", "$right", "-o", "$output"]

The "meld", "kdiff3", and "vimdiff" tools can be used out of the box, as long as they are installed.

To use a different tool named TOOL, the arguments to pass to the tool MUST be specified either inline or in the merge-tools.TOOL.merge-args key. As an example of how to set this key and other tool configuration options, here is the out-of-the-box configuration of the three default tools. (There is no need to copy it to your config file verbatim, but you are welcome to customize it.)

# merge-tools.kdiff3.program  = "kdiff3"     # Defaults to the name of the tool if not specified
merge-tools.kdiff3.merge-args = ["$base", "$left", "$right", "-o", "$output", "--auto"]
merge-tools.meld.merge-args = ["$left", "$base", "$right", "-o", "$output", "--auto-merge"]

merge-tools.vimdiff.merge-args = ["-f", "-d", "$output", "-M",
    "$left", "$base", "$right",
    "-c", "wincmd J", "-c", "set modifiable",
    "-c", "set write"]
merge-tools.vimdiff.program = "vim"
merge-tools.vimdiff.merge-tool-edits-conflict-markers = true    # See below for an explanation

jj makes the following substitutions:

• $output (REQUIRED) is replaced with the name of the file that the merge tool should output. jj will read this file after the merge tool exits.

• $left and $right are replaced with the paths to two files containing the content of each side of the conflict.

• $base is replaced with the path to a file containing the contents of the conflicted file in the last common ancestor of the two sides of the conflict.

Editing conflict markers with a tool or a text editor

By default, the merge tool starts with an empty output file. If the tool puts anything into the output file, and exits with the 0 exit code, jj assumes that the conflict is fully resolved. This is appropriate for most graphical merge tools.

Some tools (e.g. vimdiff) can present a multi-way diff but don't resolve conflict themselves. When using such tools, jj can help you by populating the output file with conflict markers before starting the merge tool (instead of leaving the output file empty and letting the merge tool fill it in). To do that, set the merge-tools.vimdiff.merge-tool-edits-conflict-markers = true option.

With this option set, if the output file still contains conflict markers after the conflict is done, jj assumes that the conflict was only partially resolved and parses the conflict markers to get the new state of the conflict. The conflict is considered fully resolved when there are no conflict markers left.

Git settings

Automatic local branch creation

By default, when jj imports a remote-tracking branch from Git, it also creates a local branch with the same name. In some repositories, this may be undesirable, e.g.:

• There is a remote with a lot of historical branches that you don't want to be exported to the co-located Git repo.
• There are multiple remotes with conflicting views of that branch, resulting in an unhelpful conflicted state.

You can disable this behavior by setting git.auto-local-branch like so,

git.auto-local-branch = false

Note that this setting may make it easier to accidentally delete remote branches. Since the local branch isn't created, the remote branch will be deleted if you push the branch with jj git push --branch or jj git push --all.

Prefix for generated branches on push

jj git push --change generates branch names with a prefix of "push-" by default. You can pick a different prefix by setting git.push-branch-prefix. For example:

git.push-branch-prefix = "martinvonz/push-"

Filesystem monitor

In large repositories, it may be beneficial to use a "filesystem monitor" to track changes to the working copy. This allows jj to take working copy snapshots without having to rescan the entire working copy.

Watchman

The Watchman filesystem monitor is currently only enabled if you compile jj with the watchman feature, such as with the following invocation:

cargo install --git https://github.com/martinvonz/jj.git --locked --bin jj jj-cli --features watchman

To configure the Watchman filesystem monitor, set core.fsmonitor = "watchman". Ensure that you have installed the Watchman executable on your system).

Debugging commands are available under jj debug watchman.

User config file

On all platforms, the user's global jj configuration file is located at either ~/.jjconfig.toml (where ~ represents $HOME on Unix-likes, or %USERPROFILE% on Windows) or in a platform-specific directory. The platform-specific location is recommended for better integration with platform services. It is an error for both of these files to exist.

Platform	Value	Example
Linux	$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/jj/config.toml	/home/alice/.config/jj/config.toml
macOS	$HOME/Library/Application Support/jj/config.toml	/Users/Alice/Library/Application Support/jj/config.toml
Windows	{FOLDERID_RoamingAppData}\jj\config.toml	C:\Users\Alice\AppData\Roaming\jj\config.toml

The location of the jj config file can also be overridden with the JJ_CONFIG environment variable. If it is not empty, it should contain the path to a TOML file that will be used instead of any configuration file in the default locations. For example,

env JJ_CONFIG=/dev/null jj log       # Ignores any settings specified in the config file.

You can use one or more --config-toml options on the command line to specify additional configuration settings. This overrides settings defined in config files or environment variables. For example,

jj --config-toml='ui.color="always"' --config-toml='ui.diff-editor="kdiff3"' split

Config specified this way must be valid TOML. In particular, string values must be surrounded by quotes. To pass these quotes to jj, most shells require surrounding those quotes with single quotes as shown above.

In sh-compatible shells, --config-toml can be used to merge entire TOML files with the config specified in .jjconfig.toml:

jj --config-toml="$(cat extra-config.toml)" log