tag

vb tag SUBCOMMAND [OPTIONS]

Description

Run various subcommands to control tags and properties.

The option –raw allows the manipulation of all types of tags used for various internal purposes in vb. It also shows cancel tags for the find and list subcommands. You should not use this option to make changes unless you are sure what you are doing.

If you need to use a tagname that might be confused with a hexadecimal baseline or artifact ID, you can explicitly disambiguate it by prefixing it with tag:. For instance:

vb update decaf

will be taken as an artifact or baseline ID and vb will probably complain that no such revision was found. However:

vb update tag:decaf

will assume that decaf is a tag/branch name.

Subcommands

vb tag add

vb tag add [OPTIONS] TAGNAME ARTIFACT-ID [VALUE]

Description

Add a new tag or property to an artifact referenced by ARTIFACT-ID. For check-ins, the tag will be usable instead of a CHECK-IN in commands such as update and merge. If the --propagate flag is present and ARTIFACT-ID refers to a wiki page, forum post, technote, or check-in, the tag propagates to all descendants of that artifact.

The --date-override and --user-override options support importing history from other SCM systems. DATETIME has the form YYYY-MMM-DD HH:MM:SS.

Note that vb uses some tag prefixes internally and this command will reject tags with these prefixes to avoid causing problems or confusion: wiki-, tkt-, event-.

Options

--date-override DATETIME

Set date and time added

-n, --dry-run

Display the tag text, but do not actually insert it into the database

--propagate

Propagating tag

--raw

Raw tag name. Ignored for non-CHECK-IN artifacts.

--user-override USER

Name USER when adding the tag

vb tag cancel

vb tag cancel [--raw] TAGNAME ARTIFACT-ID

Description

Remove the tag TAGNAME from the artifact referenced by ARTIFACT-ID, and also remove the propagation of the tag to any descendants. Use the the -n|--dry-run option to see what would have happened. Certain tag name prefixes are forbidden, as documented for the add subcommand.

Options

--date-override DATETIME

Set date and time deleted

-n, --dry-run

Display the control artifact, but do not insert it into the database

--raw

Raw tag name. Ignored for non-CHECK-IN artifacts.

--user-override USER

Name USER when deleting the tag

vb tag find

vb tag find [OPTIONS] TAGNAME

Description

List all objects that use TAGNAME.

Options

-n, --limit N

Limit to N results

--raw

Interprets tag as a raw name instead of a branch name and matches any type of artifact. Changes the output to include only the hashes of matching objects.

-t, --type TYPE

One of: ci (check-in), w (wiki), e (event/technote), f (forum post), t (ticket). Default is all types. Ignored if --raw is used.

vb tag list (ls)

vb tag list|ls [OPTIONS] [ARTIFACT-ID]

Description

List all tags or, if ARTIFACT-ID is supplied, all tags and their values for that artifact. The tagtype option accepts one of: propagated, singleton, cancel. For historical scripting compatibility, the internal tag types wiki-, tkt-, and event- (technote) are elided by default unless the --raw or --prefix options are used.

Options

-v, --inverse

Inverse the meaning of --tagtype TYPE

--prefix

List only tags with the given prefix VisionByte-internal prefixes include sym- (branch name), wiki-, event- (technote), and tkt- (ticket). The prefix is stripped from the resulting list unless --raw is provided. Ignored if ARTIFACT-ID is provided.

--raw

List raw names of tags

--sep SEP

Separator when concatenating values

--tagtype TYPE

List only tags of type TYPE, which must be one of: cancel, singleton, propagated

--values

List tag values If --sep is supplied, list all values of a tag on the same line, separated by SEP; otherwise list each value on its own line.

Examples

  • Init and open a repository

$ vb init tag_repo.vbyte
project-id: f29798c9d56932e7ca9039c8088afc7498367077
server-id:  6ea03efa37f0686ad12a75163ca21147d8fc9d64
admin-user: ubuntu (initial remote-access password is "z8ZpwUA6L4")
$ vb open -f tag_repo.vbyte
project-name: <unnamed>
repository:   /tmp/sphinx_tests/5b262c92/tag_repo/tag_repo.vbyte
local-root:   /tmp/sphinx_tests/5b262c92/tag_repo/
config-db:    /tmp/sphinx_tests/5b262c92/.visionbyte
project-code: f29798c9d56932e7ca9039c8088afc7498367077
checkout:     d998b9a553e1f0c68cb726e9d319344d54edacc8 2026-03-31 13:00:43 UTC
tags:         trunk
comment:      initial empty check-in (user: ubuntu)
check-ins:    1

  • Create a tagged check-in

$ vb sys echo "release" > release.txt
$ vb add release.txt
ADDED  release.txt
$ vb ci -m "release" --tag v1.0.0
Committed version: 3b50b6e9a4cd4e88ef1d0cc8436d0f978f540dfb871ea29dbe992a454b0a505f

  • List tags on the current check-in

$ vb tag list
trunk
v1.0.0

  • Find all objects with a tag

$ vb tag find v1.0.0
=== 2026-03-31 ===
13:00:44 [3b50b6e9a4] *CURRENT* release (user: ubuntu tags: v1.0.0, trunk)
+++ no more data (1) +++