Subject: [PATCH 3/4] hook: introduce extensions.hookStdoutToStderr

From: Adrian Ratiu <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 4 Feb 2026 19:33:27 +0200

All hooks already redirect stdout to stderr with the exception of
pre-push which has a known user who depends on the separate stdout
versus stderr outputs (the git-lfs project).

The pre-push behavior was a surprise which we found out about after
causing a regression for git-lfs. Notably, it might not be the only
exception (it's the one we know about). There might be more.

This presents a challenge because stdout_to_stderr is required for
hook parallelization, so run-command can buffer and de-interleave
the hook outputs using ungroup=0, when hook.jobs > 1.

Introduce an extension to enforce consistency: all hooks merge stdout
into stderr and can be safely parallelized. This provides a clean
separation and avoids breaking existing stdout vs stderr behavior.

When this extension is disabled, the `hook.jobs` config has no
effect for pre-push, to prevent garbled (interleaved) parallel
output, so it runs sequentially like before.

Alternatives I've considered to this extension include:
1. Allowing pre-push to run in parallel with interleaved output.
2. Always running pre-push sequentially (no parallel jobs for it).
3. Making users (only git-lfs? maybe more?) fix their hooks to read
   stderr not stdout.

Out of all these alternatives, I think this extension is the most
reasonable compromise, to not break existing users, allow pre-push
parallel jobs for those who need it (with correct outputs) and also
future-proofing in case there are any more exceptions to be added.

Signed-off-by: Adrian Ratiu <[email-masked]>
---
 Documentation/config/extensions.adoc | 12 ++++++++
 Documentation/config/hook.adoc       |  3 ++
 repository.c                         |  1 +
 repository.h                         |  1 +
 setup.c                              |  7 +++++
 setup.h                              |  1 +
 t/t1800-hook.sh                      | 42 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 transport.c                          |  7 ++---
 8 files changed, 69 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)

diff --git a/Documentation/config/extensions.adoc b/Documentation/config/extensions.adoc
index 532456644b..de47d97f6d 100644
--- a/Documentation/config/extensions.adoc
+++ b/Documentation/config/extensions.adoc
@@ -73,6 +73,18 @@ relativeWorktrees:::
 	repaired with either the `--relative-paths` option or with the
 	`worktree.useRelativePaths` config set to `true`.
 
+hookStdoutToStderr:::
+	If enabled, the stdout of all hooks is redirected to stderr. This
+	enforces consistency, since by default most hooks already behave
+	this way, with pre-push being the only known exception.
++
+This is useful for parallel hook execution (see the `hook.jobs` config in
+linkgit:git-config[1]), as it allows the output of multiple hooks running
+in parallel to be grouped (de-interleaved) correctly.
++
+Defaults to disabled. When disabled, `hook.jobs` has no effect for pre-push
+hooks, which will always be run sequentially.
+
 worktreeConfig:::
 	If enabled, then worktrees will load config settings from the
 	`$GIT_DIR/config.worktree` file in addition to the
diff --git a/Documentation/config/hook.adoc b/Documentation/config/hook.adoc
index c394756328..56e6b4e5c3 100644
--- a/Documentation/config/hook.adoc
+++ b/Documentation/config/hook.adoc
@@ -20,3 +20,6 @@ hook.jobs::
 	Specifies how many hooks can be run simultaneously during parallelized
 	hook execution. If unspecified, defaults to the number of processors on
 	the current system.
++
+This has no effect for hooks requiring separate output streams (like `pre-push`)
+unless `extensions.hookStdoutToStderr` is enabled.
diff --git a/repository.c b/repository.c
index c7e75215ac..36317cafa7 100644
--- a/repository.c
+++ b/repository.c
@@ -281,6 +281,7 @@ int repo_init(struct repository *repo,
 	repo->repository_format_worktree_config = format.worktree_config;
 	repo->repository_format_relative_worktrees = format.relative_worktrees;
 	repo->repository_format_precious_objects = format.precious_objects;
+	repo->repository_format_hook_stdout_to_stderr = format.hook_stdout_to_stderr;
 
 	/* take ownership of format.partial_clone */
 	repo->repository_format_partial_clone = format.partial_clone;
diff --git a/repository.h b/repository.h
index 6063c4b846..f358fdc877 100644
--- a/repository.h
+++ b/repository.h
@@ -165,6 +165,7 @@ struct repository {
 	int repository_format_worktree_config;
 	int repository_format_relative_worktrees;
 	int repository_format_precious_objects;
+	int repository_format_hook_stdout_to_stderr;
 
 	/* Indicate if a repository has a different 'commondir' from 'gitdir' */
 	unsigned different_commondir:1;
diff --git a/setup.c b/setup.c
index b723f8b339..cf4949c086 100644
--- a/setup.c
+++ b/setup.c
@@ -686,6 +686,9 @@ static enum extension_result handle_extension(const char *var,
 	} else if (!strcmp(ext, "relativeworktrees")) {
 		data->relative_worktrees = git_config_bool(var, value);
 		return EXTENSION_OK;
+	} else if (!strcmp(ext, "hookstdouttostderr")) {
+		data->hook_stdout_to_stderr = git_config_bool(var, value);
+		return EXTENSION_OK;
 	}
 	return EXTENSION_UNKNOWN;
 }
@@ -1947,6 +1950,8 @@ const char *setup_git_directory_gently(int *nongit_ok)
 				repo_fmt.worktree_config;
 			the_repository->repository_format_relative_worktrees =
 				repo_fmt.relative_worktrees;
+			the_repository->repository_format_hook_stdout_to_stderr =
+				repo_fmt.hook_stdout_to_stderr;
 			/* take ownership of repo_fmt.partial_clone */
 			the_repository->repository_format_partial_clone =
 				repo_fmt.partial_clone;
@@ -2047,6 +2052,8 @@ void check_repository_format(struct repository_format *fmt)
 		fmt->worktree_config;
 	the_repository->repository_format_relative_worktrees =
 		fmt->relative_worktrees;
+	the_repository->repository_format_hook_stdout_to_stderr =
+		fmt->hook_stdout_to_stderr;
 	the_repository->repository_format_partial_clone =
 		xstrdup_or_null(fmt->partial_clone);
 	clear_repository_format(&repo_fmt);
diff --git a/setup.h b/setup.h
index d55dcc6608..929a2e0ba8 100644
--- a/setup.h
+++ b/setup.h
@@ -167,6 +167,7 @@ struct repository_format {
 	char *partial_clone; /* value of extensions.partialclone */
 	int worktree_config;
 	int relative_worktrees;
+	int hook_stdout_to_stderr;
 	int is_bare;
 	int hash_algo;
 	int compat_hash_algo;
diff --git a/t/t1800-hook.sh b/t/t1800-hook.sh
index 4db1fac862..bf19579f3a 100755
--- a/t/t1800-hook.sh
+++ b/t/t1800-hook.sh
@@ -395,6 +395,48 @@ test_expect_success 'client hooks: pre-push expects separate stdout and stderr'
 	check_stdout_separate_from_stderr pre-push
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'client hooks: extension makes pre-push merge stdout to stderr' '
+	test_when_finished "rm -f stdout.actual stderr.actual" &&
+	git init --bare remote2 &&
+	git remote add origin2 remote2 &&
+	test_commit B &&
+	# repositoryformatversion=1 might be already set (eg default sha256)
+	# so check before using test_config to set it
+	{ test "$(git config core.repositoryformatversion)" = 1 ||
+	  test_config core.repositoryformatversion 1; } &&
+	git config set core.repositoryformatversion 1 &&
+	test_config extensions.hookStdoutToStderr true &&
+	setup_hooks pre-push &&
+	git push origin2 HEAD:main >stdout.actual 2>stderr.actual &&
+	check_stdout_merged_to_stderr pre-push
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'client hooks: pre-push defaults to serial execution' '
+	test_when_finished "rm -rf repo-serial" &&
+	git init --bare remote-serial &&
+	git init repo-serial &&
+	git -C repo-serial remote add origin ../remote-serial &&
+	test_commit -C repo-serial A &&
+
+	# Setup 2 pre-push hooks
+	write_script repo-serial/.git/hooks/pre-push <<-EOF &&
+	sleep 2
+	echo "Hook 1" >&2
+	EOF
+	git -C repo-serial config hook.hook-2.event pre-push &&
+	git -C repo-serial config hook.hook-2.command "sleep 2; echo Hook 2 >&2" &&
+
+	git -C repo-serial config hook.jobs 2 &&
+
+	start=$(date +%s) &&
+	git -C repo-serial push origin HEAD >out 2>err &&
+	end=$(date +%s) &&
+
+	duration=$((end - start)) &&
+	# Serial >= 4s, parallel < 4s.
+	test $duration -ge 4
+'
+
 test_expect_success 'client hooks: commit hooks expect stdout redirected to stderr' '
 	hooks="pre-commit prepare-commit-msg \
 		commit-msg post-commit \
diff --git a/transport.c b/transport.c
index 477a598eec..708118f439 100644
--- a/transport.c
+++ b/transport.c
@@ -1394,11 +1394,8 @@ static int run_pre_push_hook(struct transport *transport,
 	opt.copy_feed_pipe_cb_data = copy_pre_push_hook_data;
 	opt.free_feed_pipe_cb_data = free_pre_push_hook_data;
 
-	/*
-	 * pre-push hooks expect stdout & stderr to be separate, so don't merge
-	 * them to keep backwards compatibility with existing hooks.
-	 */
-	opt.stdout_to_stderr = 0;
+	/* merge stdout to stderr only when extensions.StdoutToStderr is enabled */
+	opt.stdout_to_stderr = the_repository->repository_format_hook_stdout_to_stderr;
 
 	ret = run_hooks_opt(the_repository, "pre-push", &opt);
 
-- 
2.52.0.732.gb351b5166d.dirty