Subject: [PATCH] archive: document --prefix handling of absolute and parent paths

From: Pushkar Singh <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 2026 16:00:06 +0000

Clarify that --prefix is used as given and is not normalized,
and may include leading slashes or parent directory components.

Signed-off-by: Pushkar Singh <[email-masked]>
---
 Documentation/git-archive.adoc | 5 +++++
 1 file changed, 5 insertions(+)

diff --git a/Documentation/git-archive.adoc b/Documentation/git-archive.adoc
index a0e3fe7996..086bade6d8 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-archive.adoc
+++ b/Documentation/git-archive.adoc
@@ -54,6 +54,11 @@ OPTIONS
 	Prepend <prefix>/ to paths in the archive.  Can be repeated; its
 	rightmost value is used for all tracked files.  See below which
 	value gets used by `--add-file`.
++
+The <prefix> is used as given and is not normalized. It may
+include leading slashes or parent directory components (e.g.,
+`../`). Some archive consumers may treat such paths as
+potentially unsafe and adjust or warn during extraction.
 
 -o <file>::
 --output=<file>::
-- 
2.53.0.582.gca1db8a0f7