# gitattributes API

gitattributes mechanism gives a uniform way to associate various attributes to set of paths.

## Data Structure

`struct git_attr`

  An attribute is an opaque object that is identified by its name. Pass the name to `git_attr()` function to obtain the object of this type. The internal representation of this structure is of no interest to the calling programs. The name of the attribute can be retrieved by calling `git_attr_name()`.

`struct git_attr_check`

  This structure represents a set of attributes to check in a call to `git_check_attr()` function, and receives the results.

## Attribute Values

An attribute for a path can be in one of four states: Set, Unset, Unspecified or set to a string, and `.value` member of `struct git_attr_check` records it. There are three macros to check these:

`ATTR_TRUE()`

  Returns true if the attribute is Set for the path.

`ATTR_FALSE()`

  Returns true if the attribute is Unset for the path.

`ATTR_UNSET()`

  Returns true if the attribute is Unspecified for the path.

If none of the above returns true, `.value` member points at a string value of the attribute for the path.

## Querying Specific Attributes

- Prepare an array of `struct git_attr_check` to define the list of attributes you would want to check. To populate this array, you would need to define necessary attributes by calling `git_attr()` function.

- Call `git_check_attr()` to check the attributes for the path.

- Inspect `git_attr_check` structure to see how each of the attribute in the array is defined for the path.

## Example

To see how attributes "crlf" and "indent" are set for different paths.

1. Prepare an array of `struct git_attr_check` with two elements (because we are checking two attributes). Initialize their `attr` member with pointers to `struct git_attr` obtained by calling `git_attr()`:

    static struct git_attr_check check[2];
    static void setup_check(void)
    {
            if (check[0].attr)
                    return; /* already done */
            check[0].attr = git_attr("crlf");
            check[1].attr = git_attr("ident");
    }

1. Call `git_check_attr()` with the prepared array of `struct git_attr_check`:

            const char *path;

            setup_check();
            git_check_attr(path, ARRAY_SIZE(check), check);

1. Act on `.value` member of the result, left in `check[]`:

            const char *value = check[0].value;

            if (ATTR_TRUE(value)) {
                    The attribute is Set, by listing only the name of the
                    attribute in the gitattributes file for the path.
            } else if (ATTR_FALSE(value)) {
                    The attribute is Unset, by listing the name of the
                    attribute prefixed with a dash - for the path.
            } else if (ATTR_UNSET(value)) {
                    The attribute is not set nor unset for the path.
            } else if (!strcmp(value, "input")) {
                    If none of ATTR_TRUE(), ATTR_FALSE(), or ATTR_UNSET() is
                    true, the value is a string set in the gitattributes
                    file for the path by saying "attr=value".
            } else if (... other check using value as string ...) {
                    ...
            }

## Querying All Attributes

To get the values of all attributes associated with a file:

- Call `git_all_attrs()`, which returns an array of `git_attr_check` structures.

- Iterate over the `git_attr_check` array to examine the attribute names and values. The name of the attribute described by a `git_attr_check` object can be retrieved via `git_attr_name(check[i].attr)`. (Please note that no items will be returned for unset attributes, so `ATTR_UNSET()` will return false for all returned `git_array_check` objects.)

- Free the `git_array_check` array.