How to Set Up Git Commit Email Notifications

A method to send email notification to a list of email addresses by the remote git server after every push from the client will be introduced in this post. An example notification email after a commit is shown in the figure below. The subject contains a prefix, the repository name, the branch name and the last commit message. The body of the email contains a summary of the changes and the commit log.

How does it work

After the client pushing to the git server, several actions are triggered. These actions are done by hooks. Hooks are scripts placed in the GIT_DIR/hooks directory. Here, GIT_DIR is the directory of the git repository on the git server. One of the trigger action is post-receive,  so we can put a executable script with name post-receive under GIT_DIR/hooks. For every push by clients, post-receive will be executed to send email notification.

Now lets go to the detail of how to set up the email notification.

Install mailx

The script uses mailx to send emails out. You need to install mailx on your git server.

On Fedora 12+/RHEL6+/CentOS6+, the mailx package works just fine.

On Debian/Ubuntu/Linux Mint, please install the heirloom-mailx package instead of using the default bsd-mailx package. The mailx from bsd-mailx does not support all the options used such as -r in the script.

Get the post-receive script

My script that sends email like the example described above can be downloaded from: git post-receive script.

Or view the source code: git post-receive script

This script uses mailx to send email by default which uses the local message transfer agent service (like sendmail) to send email. You need to enable the message transfer agent to send out emails on your git server. You can also choose to use smtp to send out email, just find the line

# cat $email_tmp_file | mailx -S smtp="smtp://smtp.cse.ust.hk" -s "$emailsubject" -r $senderemail $recipients

near to the bottom of the script, uncomment it out, comment out the next line which calls mailx, and change the smtp server to yours. The script will use smtp server to send email. If you like to use Gmail’s smtp, please refer to .

This script is changed from Andy Parkins’s one which is in git’s distribution. On fedora 12, the original script can be found under /usr/share/git-core/contrib/hooks.

Put the post-receive script into hooks directory

After getting the post-receive script, you need to copy it to or make a soft link (which I do since there usually many repositories) in the GIT_DIR/hooks/ directory on the git server.

Please note that this script should be executable. You may need to add executable mod bits to post-receive by

chmod a+x hooks/post-receive

when you are in GIT_DIR.

If you use soft links, setting the original post-receive file once is sufficient.

Change the repository description

The repository name in the email subject is the first line of $GIT_DIR/description. Change the first line of the description file to you project’s name.

Change the config file

The sender’s email address, the mail list and the subject prefix is defined in GIT_DIR/config file. I like to edit this config file by hand which is as easy as using git config command.

Add these line to the config file:

[hooks]
   mailinglist = "email1@example.com email2@example.com"

The email addressed in mailing list is separated by space.

The default subject prefix is [GIT]. You can change it to any string you like by adding hooks.emailprefix in the config file.

Now the email notification mechanism has been set up. You can change the script if more functions are needed. If you think your new version is great and would like to share it, send me a pull request.

Eric Ma

Eric is a systems guy. Eric is interested in building high-performance and scalable distributed systems and related technologies. The views or opinions expressed here are solely Eric's own and do not necessarily represent those of any third parties.

18 comments:

  1. Hi,

    My post-receive-email scrip does not have the line to uncomment.
    # cat $email_tmp_file | mailx -S smtp=”smtp://smtp.cse.ust.hk” -s “$emailsubject” -r $senderemail $recipients
    I recently installed GIT on Ubuntu. Can you please update you tutorial for the lastest version of GIT?

    Regards,

    1. still looking for answer to my question above. Just to let you know that my GIT version 1.91.

      Regards,

  2. Hi Eric,
    JFYI my mailx ( bsd-mailx, 8.1.2-0.20141216cvs-1) does not provide the “-r” option.
    Thanks for providing that script.
    regards
    Ralf

    1. Hi Ralf,

      On Ubuntu/Debian/Linux Mint, please use `heirloom-mailx` mailx package.

      I will update the post with the piece of information since it seems many Ubuntu users have the same problem as yours.

  3. Previous comments:

    Dhivya S
    Hi
    – What exactly will be the senderemail ? I want whoever committed,
    to be ‘sender’ of the email

    Eric Zhiqiang Ma
    That will be a nice feature. But I got no time to implement it at
    current. There are some cases that should be took care of. For
    example:
    1. The push contains multiple commits possibly by merging another
    braunch from the others. Whoses email to use?
    2. The committer may have no email set and a email address like
    user@localhost will be provided. This may possibly lead the email
    to be rejected by some email providers.
    If you or someone else would lile to add the new feature, do send me a
    pull request or a patch.

    Eric Zhiqiang Ma
    Updated script on Mar. 7, 2014: use `mailx` to send email by default which
    uses the local message transfer agent service (like `sendmail`) to
    send email. Just downloading the script and enable the message
    transfer agent and it should work.

    Sumer Joshi
    Hi!
    I am using Gitlab with the post-receive script. However, whenever I
    try to commit code, I’m getting this error message:
    remote:
    *** hooks.mailinglist is not set so no email will be sent
    remote:
    *** for refs/heads/master update
    632bdbcddeff12a6249ffdd2a6daca5e338c55f2->a8791e7d6abf81bf9c431958c52ee985a5e16111
    To git@ssd-git.juniper.net:extracting-data-from-mysql-to-csv.git
    632bdbc..a8791e7
    master -> master
    error: unable to create directory for
    .git/refs/remotes/origin/master
    error: Cannot lock the ref
    ‘refs/remotes/origin/master’.
    I already set the hooks.mailinglist query in the config file of the
    project. I was not sure how to go about fixing this issue.

    Eric Zhiqiang Ma
    I am not familiar wiht Gitlab. But please check whether Gitlab will
    use the config file for configuration. It will be strange if it
    does not.

    Rafeta124
    Hello,
    finnaly someone get this work with that excelent code.
    I’ve downloaded your script but I don’t know how to configure it.
    I’m using Gitlab 6.4 and the Hooks path is on gitlab-shell/hooks.
    Where do I can put the mailling address configs???
    Have you tested it
    with gitlab???
    Sorry
    for my poor english

    Zhiqiang (Eric) Ma
    Hi Rafeta, this script is for the vanilla git instead of gitlab. You
    may need to integrated it into the gitlab systems if you need. For
    vanilla git, it is under the .config. But this may be different for
    the gitlab.

    guest13498
    Hi,
    which version of mailx are you using? I installed bsd-mailx on my
    Ubuntu but it doesn’t have the -S option to specify the smtp
    server?

    Zhiqiang Ma
    Please find a discussion on the mailx client on Ubuntu
    here:http://www.fclose.com/1473/setting-up-git-commit-email-notification/#comment-1076550845

    Paul Theodoropoulos
    Hi,
    I’ve been tasked with implementing this on our local gitlab server
    (v3.0.3). I’ve gone the the various configuration steps listed
    above, and was just about to put the script into the git hooks dir –
    but then I found that post-receive is currently a link
    to
    post-receive -> /home/git/.gitolite/hooks/common/post-receive. And that is a script
    that part of the whole gitlab setup, containing the following:
    {{{
    #!/usr/bin/env bash
    # This file was placed here by GitLab. It makes sure that your pushed commits
    # will be processed properly.
    while
    read oldrev newrev ref
    do
    # For every branch or tag that was pushed, create a Resque job in redis.
    pwd=`pwd`
    reponame=`basename
    “$pwd” | sed s/.git$//`
    env -i redis-cli rpush
    “resque:queue:post_receive”
    “{“class”:”PostReceive”,”args”:[“$reponame”,”$oldrev”,”$newrev”,”$ref”,”$G
    L_USER”]}”
    > /dev/null 2>&1
    done
    }}}
    So, I guess my question would be, can I just *append* this post-receive
    script to the bottom of that existing post-receive script? Or am I
    on the wrong track here….

    Zhiqiang Ma
    Hi Paul,
    At the first glance, it should not work after simply appending the
    script to the bottom of your existing one.
    For example,
    Both scripts have:
    {{{
    while
    read oldrev…
    }}}
    after one script reads the input from the STDIN, the other script will
    fail to get it.
    But after some minor changes, it should work.
    For the example above, you may just keep (or save) these variables and
    change the 2nd script to use these variables instead of read them
    from the STDIN.
    Beside of this, you may change other minor aspects as also.

    Paul Theodoropoulos
    Thank you Zhiqiang-Ma, I appreciate the quick response!

    Leo
    Hello!
    I am trying to configure smtp like that:
    {{{
    cat
    $email_tmp_file | mailx -v -s “$emailsubject” -s
    smtp-use-starttls -s ssl-verify=ignore -S smtp-auth=login -s
    smtp=smtp://smtp.gmail.com:587 -s from=mail@domain -s
    smtp-auth-user=mail@domain -s smtp-auth-password=QWERTY -s
    ssl-verify=ignore -r $senderemail $recipients
    }}}
    But it doesn’t work at all. Where is my mistake?

    Zhiqiang Ma
    What output of the command do you get?

    stuart
    I’ve a remote bare repo at a windows client and when git tries to run the
    script it says “mailx” command not found.
    Help please!

    Zhiqiang Ma
    This means that ‘mailx’ is not installed on the system. If you are
    using Fedora, try run ‘yum install mailx’ as root. On other
    distros, please try to install the package the provides mailx.

    liuzhong my
    dear ma:
    last week i installed
    turnkey-gitlab-12.0-squeeze-x86.iso in my pc,this git system include
    some useful tools ,such as gitlab ,webmin.and so on .and the git
    server was well configured ,i could add and commit my code to the
    server,now i want to automaly send emails to the users in my team ,i
    read your article for long time ,but i can not do it ,please help
    me, my mail:hds1989824@163.com thank you

    Zhiqiang Ma
    Hi liuzhong,
    I am sorry that I am not familiar with turnkey-gitlab. But if you can
    provide more details, I may help you to discuss / find possible
    solutions. You are always welcome to ask questions in the forum
    (http://www.fclose.com/b/forum/linux-related-forum2/ ).

    liuzhong
    OK ,the turnkeylinux-gitlab include gitolite gitlab ,i downloaded the
    iso and burn it to a cd ,it is easy to install,avoid use command
    mode install a lot of packages and soft if my pc’s os is ubantu
    or fedroa. it simple to use.but I donot know $GIT_DIR/description
    mean , i can not find it in my pc..
    and can you tell me your
    mail in order to send same pic to you ?
    at last please fogive
    my Chinglish. hehe

    Zhiqiang Ma
    I see. GIT_DIR is the directory of the git repository on the git
    server. This is a unclear part of this tutorial. I have updated
    it. GIT_DIR/description is the file named description in the git
    repository directory.
    I prefer to discuss the question related to the posts here or in
    the forum. But if you want to contact me by email, please find it
    here: http://www.fclose.com/b/contact/

    hds1989824
    i am sorry ,mybe i have a mistake .i haved install a turnkeylinux
    on my pc somedays ago,and i found it was a debian system a few
    minutes ago! so i might set the post-recive files in a wrong
    place!not in the responsity/project/hooks/ ,your script ” on
    debian the hook is stored in # /usr/share/doc/git-core/contrib/hooks/post-receive-email:” ,and i will try another time. i will be carefull!

    Zhiqiang Ma
    This script should be okay with most Linux distros including Debian.
    The script here is actually a modified version of the script
    from the git-core or similar package. You can download the
    script here into the hooks/ or save it to somewhere and share
    the script by many repositories by soft links.

    smh
    Is it possible to display the changes made
    eg
    + some text

    some text
    I tried adding the following to the config under [hooks]
    {{{
    git show
    -C %s; echo
    }}}
    but this hasn’t done anything

    Zhiqiang Ma
    You may consider modifying the generate_update_branch_email() function
    in the script.
    For example: modifying the ‘git diff-tree –stat –summary
    –find-copies-harder $oldrev..$newrev’ line with the one you want.

    Steven Dobbelaere
    I installed the script but when I execute it in the terminal I get
    this error: “GIT_DIR not set”
    Any idea on how I can set my GIT_DIR variable
    I suspect I have to do it here:
    {{{
    # — Config
    # Set GIT_DIR either from the working directory, or from the environment
    # variable.
    GIT_DIR=$(git rev-parse
    –git-dir 2>/dev/null)
    if [ -z “$GIT_DIR” ];
    then
    echo >&2 “fatal: post-receive: GIT_DIR not
    set”
    exit 1
    fi
    }}}

    Zhiqiang Ma
    Hi Steven,
    This script should be run by the git server automatically. Just save a
    copy in hooks/post-receive in the git directory on the server side.
    It will be invoked automatically by git when you push to the
    repository.

    Akzhan Feel
    free to use colored diffs with https://github.com/bitboxer/git-commit-notifier

    digitalpbk
    Can somebody explain how to run this script from command line ?

    Zhiqiang Ma
    This script is designed to be automatically invoked by git rather than
    for run from command line.
    You may consider adapting it for command line use if you like. The
    source code can be downloaded in the link in the post.

    Sam change
    sh to bash.
    remove -r option
    works fine then

    Zhiqiang Ma
    Hi Rainer,
    You can find out the lines that have the msg_count and comment them out
    to bypass these warnings (there are only several lines). It seems
    the bash on your computer doesn’t support the ((msg_count+=1))
    operation.
    Nice to know that you find the script useful ;)

    Rainer aaah,
    thanks for the quick !
    i managed to find the -S option and took it out. had to also remove -r
    and now i’m happily sending mails, thanks!
    :)
    still have ugly output, though, something is wrong around the msg_count
    variable:
    Counting
    objects: 5, done.
    Delta compression using up to 2 threads.
    Total
    3 (delta 2), reused 0 (delta 0)
    hooks/post-receive: 706:
    msg_count+=1: not found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected
    operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706: msg_count+=1: not found
    [:
    706: ==: unexpected operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706:
    msg_count+=1: not found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected
    operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706: msg_count+=1: not found
    [:
    706: ==: unexpected operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706:
    msg_count+=1: not found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected
    operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706: msg_count+=1: not found
    [:
    706: ==: unexpected operator
    cat: /tmp/git-email-subject-10682:
    No such file or directory

    but things work! thanks!

    Zhiqiang Ma
    @Rainer It seems that you are using a distribution with old (not too old)
    software. In RHEL/CentOS 5, the mailx version are very old and it
    doesn’t support -S option. You can try to put these parameters
    into the ~/.mailrc file.

    Rainer
    Hi, cool script thanks!
    Doesn’t work for me though, failing with the following issue:
    git stuff
    ……
    hooks/post-receive: 706: msg_count+=1: not
    found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706:
    msg_count+=1: not found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected
    operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706: msg_count+=1: not found
    [:
    706: ==: unexpected operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706:
    msg_count+=1: not found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected
    operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706: msg_count+=1: not found
    [:
    706: ==: unexpected operator
    hooks/post-receive: 706:
    msg_count+=1: not found
    [: 706: ==: unexpected operator
    cat:
    /tmp/git-email-subject-10489: No such file or directory
    mailx:
    invalid option — ‘S’
    usage: mailx [-eIinv] [-a header] [-b
    bcc-addr] [-c cc-addr] [-s subject] to-addr …
    [–
    sendmail-options …]
    mailx [-eIiNnv] -f [name]
    mailx
    [-eIiNnv] [-u user]
    I hate bash, can’t read it, sorry. otherwise i’d go hunting for
    this bug myself!

    1. Aurelien, your script is for GitHub.
      Is it simple enough to edit it and use in local gitolite v3 environment?

      1. Hi Ilya, you’re right, my script relies on GitHub’s REST API. In particular it is meant to notify you only for GitHub repositories you are *watching*. Unfortunately it looks like there is no such feature in gitolite.

  4. Hi Zhiqiang ,
    I have get such an error:

    Counting objects: 5, done.
    Delta compression using up to 8 threads.
    Compressing objects: 100% (2/2), done.
    Writing objects: 100% (3/3), 262 bytes | 0 bytes/s, done.
    Total 3 (delta 1), reused 0 (delta 0)
    remote: smtp-server: 500 Error: bad syntax
    remote: . . . message not sent.
    To git@192.168.1.61:/testing.git
    7a83f60..7d12599 master -> master

    Could you help me to take a look ?

    1. OK, It ‘s my fault, it is cause by the mailx -r
      If I not use -r option , it works fine. Maybe there some mistake in configure the mail agent.

  5. To those who want to re-use the script here for other purpose:

    The line ” cat $email_tmp_file | mailx -s “$emailsubject” -r $senderemail $recipients” near to the end of the script sends the email out. You may change it to some other commands to do actions you want.

  6. Just in case you are on windows , use blat.exe it works flawlessly. Thanks Eric for great work!!.

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