Branches command
Azure DevOps Services | Azure DevOps Server 2022 - Azure DevOps Server 2019
Visual Studio 2019 | Visual Studio 2022
Displays the history of a branch for a specified file or folder.
Prerequisites
| Category | Requirements |
|---|---|
| Permissions | Read permission set to Allow for the item and any branches to view their history. |
For more information, see Default TFVC permissions.
Syntax
tf branches itemspec [/version:versionspec] [/collection:TeamProjectCollectionUrl] [/login:username,[password]]
Parameters
Argument
Argument
Description
<Itemspec>
Identifies the file or folder that contains the branch you want to examine. For more information about how TFVC parses <itemspec>s to determine which items are within scope, see Use Team Foundation version control commands, Use options to modify how a command functions.
<versionspec>
Provides a value for the /version option. For more information about how TFVC parses a version specification to determine which items are within its scope, see Use Team Foundation version control commands.
<TeamProjectCollectionUrl>
The URL of the project collection that contains a file or folder in a branch for which you want to display the history, for example, http://myserver:8080/tfs/DefaultCollection.
<username>
Provides a value to the /login option. You can specify a username value as either Domain\username or username.
Option
Option
Description
/version
Specifies the version for the path. This option is rarely used.
/collection
Specifies the project collection.
/login
Specifies the user name and password to authenticate the user with Azure DevOps.
Remarks
The branches command tells you when an item has been the source or destination of a branch operation. The output displays the parent branch for each version.
For more information on how to use the tf command-line utility, see Use Team Foundation version control commands.
Examples
The following examples assume that c:\projects maps to the main folder in the workspace.
The following example displays branch history for the version-controlled file C:\314.cs.
c:\projects>tf branches 314.cs
The following example displays branch history for the header.h item in the Team Foundation version control server.
c:\projects>tf branches $/applications/header.h
The following example displays the branch history of the folder $/rel30/math.
c:\projects>tf branches $/rel30/math/
The following example displays the branch history for WindowsApplication13-branch. The results indicate the history for the specified branch by using angle brackets.
D:\projects\ws1>tf branches WindowsApplication13-branch
$/jun16-1/WindowsApplication13
>> $/jun16-1/WindowsApplication13-branch Branched from version 3 <<
$/jun16-1/WindowsApplication13-branch-prime Branched from version 5
$/jun16-1/WindowsApplication13-branch2 Branched from version 3