You might want to use `git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD` or `git name-rev --name-only HEAD` instead of `git branch`. Plumbing commands (such as rev-parse or name-ref) are generally more interface-stable to use in a script than porcelain commands (such as git branch) which are designed for interactive use where output may change depending on user environment and configuration.

I’ve heard this advice given before and initially followed it but ‘git branch’ and parsing the output works in a few cases (I don’t recall what they are at this time) that less hackey approaches don’t.

I think that might be `git symbolic-ref` which doesn't work in detached HEAD state (e.g. when checking out a commit) whereas `git rev-parse --abbrev-ref` will print "HEAD". On the other hand, `git name-rev` will try to find the nearest named ref (including tags) and how far HEAD is from that named ref (e.g. master~1).

Internally, symbolic-ref resolve the ref in the same way as git branch, just without handling detached HEAD. __git_ps1 use a combination of rev-parse, symbolic-ref and git describe to provide a more interesting output for displaying state of the working directory.

To have the similar output for detached HEAD as git-status (e.g. "HEAD detached at fa0c4e1") then probably `git rev-parse --abbrev-rev` and `git rev-parse --short` should be used together. Unfortunately, while rev-parse can print multiple output in a single command, abbrev-rev and short cannot be used together. In such case, parsing `git status` might indeed be more suitable as it spawn only one executable instead of two.

Some porcelain commands do have --porcelain flag to ensure the stability of the interface, though (e.g. `git status --porcelain=v1`).

makes sense. thanks!

Nowadays there's the `--show-current` option:

    git branch --show-current

See https://git-scm.com/docs/git-branch

This is my prompt that shows my git branch, AWS_PROFILE etc:

    if [ "$color_prompt" = yes ]; then
        PS1='\[\033[0;32m\]\[\033[0m\033[0;32m\]\u\ 
        [\033[0;36m\] @ \[\033[0;36m\]\h \w\ 
        [\033[0;32m\]$(__git_ps1)\n\[\033[0;32m\]└─\ 
        [\033[0m\033[0;32m\] \$\[\033[0m\033[0;32m\] 
        AWS:${AWS_PROFILE} ▶\[\033[0m\] '
    else
        PS1='${debian_chroot:+($debian_chroot)}\u@\h:\w\$ '
    fi

This is the PS1 I've been using for a long time:

export PS1="\n\$(kube_ps1)\n\[\033[01;32m\]\u@\h\[\033[00m\]:\[\033[01;34m\]\w\[\033[0;31m\]\$(__git_ps1)\n\$\[\033[00m\] "

Note it needs the git-prompt.sh script (usually comes with the bash-completion package), and the kube-ps1 script: https://github.com/jonmosco/kube-ps1

It will show you the current kubernetes profile and namespace, user@host, current directory and git branch if you're in a git repo.

I recently added a count of stashes (in red) following the branch name, and I've been liking it.