diff --git a/Documentation/config.txt b/Documentation/config.txt
index bbba728d09bbb578f86c1ef171d24b53c1178fa3..b3023b817244d5b315f8e3227eaa87fd888ecf95 100644
--- a/Documentation/config.txt
+++ b/Documentation/config.txt
@@ -443,7 +443,7 @@ core.sharedRepository::
 
 core.warnAmbiguousRefs::
 	If true, Git will warn you if the ref name you passed it is ambiguous
-	and might match multiple refs in the .git/refs/ tree. True by default.
+	and might match multiple refs in the repository. True by default.
 
 core.compression::
 	An integer -1..9, indicating a default compression level.
diff --git a/Documentation/gitcli.txt b/Documentation/gitcli.txt
index dc9e617a10d58769a5338d06794f338ba9970d08..9ac5088acd3e0cf9541ef097c26f19c5f462b770 100644
--- a/Documentation/gitcli.txt
+++ b/Documentation/gitcli.txt
@@ -107,13 +107,14 @@ couple of magic command line options:
 ---------------------------------------------
 $ git describe -h
 usage: git describe [options] <committish>*
+   or: git describe [options] --dirty
 
     --contains            find the tag that comes after the commit
     --debug               debug search strategy on stderr
-    --all                 use any ref in .git/refs
-    --tags                use any tag in .git/refs/tags
-    --abbrev [<n>]        use <n> digits to display SHA-1s
-    --candidates <n>      consider <n> most recent tags (default: 10)
+    --all                 use any ref
+    --tags                use any tag, even unannotated
+    --long                always use long format
+    --abbrev[=<n>]        use <n> digits to display SHA-1s
 ---------------------------------------------
 
 --help-all::
diff --git a/builtin/describe.c b/builtin/describe.c
index 04c185b1fbdc51ba9958fdb83d1c6616bcb0c18e..ca084c675ef80deaac7a3f8615c1ea3329a97421 100644
--- a/builtin/describe.c
+++ b/builtin/describe.c
@@ -402,8 +402,8 @@ int cmd_describe(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
 	struct option options[] = {
 		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "contains",   &contains, N_("find the tag that comes after the commit")),
 		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "debug",      &debug, N_("debug search strategy on stderr")),
-		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "all",        &all, N_("use any ref in .git/refs")),
-		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "tags",       &tags, N_("use any tag in .git/refs/tags")),
+		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "all",        &all, N_("use any ref")),
+		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "tags",       &tags, N_("use any tag, even unannotated")),
 		OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "long",       &longformat, N_("always use long format")),
 		OPT__ABBREV(&abbrev),
 		OPT_SET_INT(0, "exact-match", &max_candidates,