git filter-repo is a versatile tool for rewriting history.
git-filter-repo destructively rewrites history (unless --analyze or --dry-run are given) according to specified rules.
It refuses to do any rewriting unless either run from a clean fresh clone, or --force was given.
While most users will probably just use filter-repo as a simple command line tool (and likely only use a few of its flags), at its core filter-repo contains a library for creating history rewriting tools.
This is free and open source software.
Key Features
- Several different types of history rewrites are possible; examples include (but are not limited to):
- Stripping large files (or large directories or large extensions).
- Stripping unwanted files by path.
- Extracting wanted paths and their history (stripping everything else).
- Restructuring the file layout (such as moving all files into a subdirectory in preparation for merging with another repo, making a subdirectory become the new toplevel directory, or merging two directories with independent filenames into one directory).
- Renaming tags (also often in preparation for merging with another repo).
- Replacing or removing sensitive text such as passwords.
- Making mailmap rewriting of user names or emails permanent.
- Making grafts or replacement refs permanent.
- Rewriting commit messages.
- Additionally, several concerns are handled automatically (many of these can be overridden, but they are all on by default):
- Rewriting (possibly abbreviated) hashes in commit messages to refer to the new post-rewrite commit hashes.
- Pruning commits which become empty due to the above filters (also handles edge cases like pruning of merge commits which become degenerate and empty).
- Creating replace-refs for old commit hashes, which if manually pushed and fetched will allow users to continue to refer to new commits using (unabbreviated) old commit IDs.
- Stripping of original history to avoid mixing old and new history.
- Repacking the repository post-rewrite to shrink the repo for the user.
- Safety mechanism:
- Abort if run from a repo that is not a fresh clone (to prevent accidental data loss from rewriting local history that doesn’t exist anywhere else).
- Option to analyze a repository and generate reports that can be useful in determining what to filter (or in determining whether a separate filtering command was successful).
Website: github.com/newren/git-filter-repo
Support:
Developer: Elijah Newren
License: MIT License
git-filter-repo is written in Python. Learn Python with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| Git Tools for Diff Review and Repository History | |
|---|---|
| difftastic | Structural diff tool that compares files based on their syntax |
| git-filter-repo | Quickly rewrite git repository history |
| onefetch | Displays information about a local Git repository |
| git-stats | Local git statistics including GitHub-like contributions calendars |
| diff-so-fancy | Attractive diffs with diff-highlight and more |
| BFG Repo-Cleaner | Clean unwanted data from Git repository history |
| git-delta | Viewer for git and diff output |
| gitlogue | Cinematic Git commit replay tool |
| git-quick-stats | Access various statistics in a git repository |
| git-who | Command-line Git analysis tool |
| git-standup | Recall what you did on the last working day |
| git-of-theseus | Analyze how a Git repo grows over time |
| git-sizer | Compute various size metrics for a git repository |
| diffnav | Git diff pager based on delta but with a file tree, à la GitHub |
| critique | Terminal UI for reviewing git diffs |
| git-big-picture | Visualization tool for Git repositories |
| hercules | Gain advanced insights from Git repository history |
| keifu | TUI that visualizes Git commit graphs |
| git-fame | Git repository collaborators sorted by contributions |
| needle | Highlights GitHub PRs |
| mergiraf | Git merge driver |
| git-history | Analyze Git history using SQLite |
| ec | Terminal Git mergetool |
| diffr | Word-by-word diff highlighting utility |
| git-scope | Fast TUI dashboard to view the git status of all your repositories |
| mamediff | Manages unstaged and staged Git diffs |
| deadbranch | Keep Git repositories tidy |
| GitTop | Lightweight desktop client for GitHub notifications |
| git-heatmap | Generates a customizable heatmap |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
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