Question

I’m looking for something like git list-path printing the
path of the associated repository (the .git directory).

A bit of background: I have set up git version control on quite a few of my
projects/folders. Some of them are nested, so one directory with echo own repository is a subfolder to another directory tracked with another repository.

E.g. in my home directory (~) I use git to track my dot files, but
in folder ~/photo/meta-mix/ I have another project I track with a
separate repository. Now, say,I have set up another project in directory
~/photo/meta-match/, but I don’t know anymore whether it has its own
repository. So I want to find out whether this directory is version
controlled and where its repository is.

How can I do this with a git command? git status can give me

nothing to commit

in both cases, when ~/photo/meta-match/ has its own repository or when it just refers to the repository of ~.

Answer 1

git rev-parse --show-toplevel

could be enough if executed within a git repo.
From git rev-parse man page:

--show-toplevel

Show the absolute path of the top-level directory.

For older versions (before 1.7.x), the other options are listed in “Is there a way to get the git root directory in one command?“:

git rev-parse --git-dir

That would give the path of the .git directory.

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The OP mentions:

git rev-parse --show-prefix

which returns the local path under the git repo root. (empty if you are at the git repo root)

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Note: for simply checking if one is in a git repo, I find the following command quite expressive:

git rev-parse --is-inside-work-tree

And yes, if you need to check if you are in a .git git-dir folder:

git rev-parse --is-inside-git-dir