`git commit -v` by default

If you are using git 2.9, this can be done with a config.

git config --global commit.verbose true

Git 2.9.0 Release Notes: https://github.com/git/git/blob/v2.9.0/Documentation/RelNotes/2.9.0.txt

"git commit" learned to pay attention to the "commit.verbose" configuration variable and act as if the "--verbose" option was given from the command line.

As far as I can tell, you can not override an already existing git command with an alias (otherwise, there would be no way to do the original command, and a bunch of stuff would break).

So I recommend you do something like git config --global "alias.ci" "commit -v". This will add a line to your ~/.gitconfig file and make it so that git ci does git commit -v. You should then just get into the habit of typing git ci instead of git commit (unless you decide you don't want the -v).

Well, I use aliases:

alias gc='git commit -v'

There are a bunch of nice aliases like this that I got off the PeepCode git screencasts, I believe.