I recommend to look into git log --help and git rev-list --help .
I just created 2 scripts to list commits from Git repositories. It’s more in the score of an alias actually, so nothing comprehensive here. If you have some one-liners, alias or scripts for commits listing, please share here. The link of this post goes to the git log documentation. I’ll share mine in the comments too rather than in the post.
Completely distinct, yes.
An API (Application Programming Interface) is specifically for application developers who are writing an application that interfaces with this system. By definition, this is not the action of an end user.
An end user, on the other hand, is someone who cannot be assumed to know anything about the internals (plumbing) and needs a user interface that, ideally, hides all the plumbing entirely and presents an abstracted interface (a porcelain) that makes sense for the task they want to perform, regardless of whether or not the concepts there actually represent what’s going on in the plumbing.