Git 1.8.0 can access Windows and GNOME keyrings

Git maintainer Junio C Hamano has announced the latest feature release of the open source version control system. Git 1.8.0 includes several new features, refined command syntax and a large number of fixes since version 1.7.12, which was the last feature release of the software from 19 August.

Git now has new credential helpers to access a user's keychain on Windows systems and the GNOME Keyring on Linux. The Git GUI interface has also been updated. Several commands have also received new options including git cherry-pick, git difftool, git grep, git log, git rebase and the git daemon. When handling email, git am now sanitises the Subject line of messages and git send-email was changed to ask for confirmation when the user input does not look like an email address. Details about the changes and new commands and the numerous fixes in this version are available in the release notes.

The developers have begun porting the version control system to HP's NonStop operating system. Hamano previously announced that the next version of the tool (1.9.0) will change the behaviour of the git push command to prevent users from accidentally overwriting branches on remote servers.

Git 1.8.0 is available for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and Solaris from the project's download page. The code for the version control system is hosted on GitHub, licensed under the GPLv2. To download the tool's source code with Git itself, users can use git clone: git clone https://github.com/git/git.git

(fab)