How to merge specific files from Git branches

Question

I have 2 git branches branch1 and branch2 and I want to merge file py in branch2 into file py in branch1 and only that file   In essence I just want to work on the file py in branch1 but want to take advantage of the merge command  What is the best way to do this

User · Answer

Although not a merge per se  sometimes the entire contents of another file on another branch are needed  Jason Rudolph s blog post provides a simple way to copy files from one branch to another  Apply the technique as follows     git checkout branch1   ensure in branch1 is checked out and active   git checkout branch2 file py   Now file py is now in branch1

User · Answer

None of the other current answers will actually  merge  the files  as if you were using the merge command   At best they ll require you to manually pick diffs   If you actually want to take advantage of merging using the information from a common ancestor  you can follow a procedure based on one found in the  Advanced Merging  section of the git Reference Manual   For this protocol  I m assuming you re wanting to merge the file  path to file txt  from origin master into HEAD - modify as appropriate   You don t have to be in the top directory of your repository  but it helps      Find the merge base SHA1  the common ancestor  for the two commits  git merge-base HEAD origin master    Get the contents of the files at each stage git show  lt merge-base SHA1 gt  path to file txt  gt    file common txt git show HEAD path to file txt  gt    file ours txt git show origin master path to file txt  gt    file theirs txt    You can pre-edit any of the files  e g  run a formatter on it   if you want     Merge the files git merge-file -p   file ours txt   file common txt   file theirs txt  gt    file merged txt    Resolve merge conflicts in   file merged txt   Copy the merged version to the destination   Clean up the intermediate files   git merge-file should use all of your default merge settings for formatting and the like   Also note that if your  ours  is the working copy version and you don t want to be overly cautious  you can operate directly on the file   git merge-base HEAD origin master git show  lt merge-base SHA1 gt  path to file txt  gt    file common txt git show origin master path to file txt  gt    file theirs txt git merge-file path to file txt   file common txt   file theirs txt

User · Answer

The solution I found that caused me the least headaches  git checkout  lt b1 gt  git checkout -b dummy git merge  lt b2 gt  git checkout  lt b1 gt  git checkout dummy  lt path to file gt   After doing that the file in path to file in b2 is what it would be after a full merge with b1

User · Answer

The simplest solution is  git checkout the name of the source branch and the paths to the specific files that we want to add to our current branch git checkout sourceBranchName pathToFile

User · Answer

What I ve done is a bit manual  but I    Merged the branches normally  Reverted the merge with revert  Checked out all my files to HEAD 1  that is  their state in the merge commit  Rebased my commits to hide this hackery from the commit history    Ugly  Yes  Easy to remember  Also yes

User · Answer

I am in same situation  I want to merge a file from a branch which has many commits on it on 2 branch  I tried many ways above and other I found on the internet and all failed  because commit history is complex  so I decide to do my way  the crazy way    git merge  lt other-branch gt  cp file-to-merge file-to-merge example git reset --hard HEAD  or HEAD 1 if no conflicts happen  cp file-to-merge example file-to-merge

User · Answer

If you only care about the conflict resolution and not about keeping the commit history  the following method should work  Say you want to merge a py b py from BRANCHA into BRANCHB  First  make sure any changes in BRANCHB are either committed or stashed away  and that there are no untracked files  Then  git checkout BRANCHB git merge BRANCHA    Accept  all changes git add     Clear staging area git reset HEAD --     Stash only the files you want to keep git stash push a py b py   Remove all other changes git add   git reset --hard   Now  pull the changes git stash pop  git won t recognize that there are conflicts in a py b py  but the merge conflict markers are there if there were in fact conflicts  Using a third-party merge tool  such as VSCode  one will be able to resolve conflicts more comfortably

User · Answer

Are all the modifications to file py in branch2 in their own commits  separate from modifications to other files  If so  you can simply cherry-pick the changes over   git checkout branch1 git cherry-pick  lt commit-with-changes-to-file py gt    Otherwise  merge does not operate over individual paths   you might as well just create a git diff patch of file py changes from branch2 and git apply them to branch1   git checkout branch2 git diff  lt base-commit-before-changes-to-file py gt  -- file py  gt  my patch git checkout branch1 git apply my patch

User · Answer

When content is in file py from branch2 that is no longer applies to branch1  it requires picking some changes and leaving others  For full control do an interactive merge using the --patch switch     git checkout --patch branch2 file py   The interactive mode section in the man page for git-add 1  explains the keys that are to be used   y - stage this hunk n - do not stage this hunk q - quit  do not stage this hunk nor any of the remaining ones a - stage this hunk and all later hunks in the file d - do not stage this hunk nor any of the later hunks in the file g - select a hunk to go to   - search for a hunk matching the given regex j - leave this hunk undecided  see next undecided hunk J - leave this hunk undecided  see next hunk k - leave this hunk undecided  see previous undecided hunk K - leave this hunk undecided  see previous hunk s - split the current hunk into smaller hunks e - manually edit the current hunk   - print help   The split command is particularly useful

User · Answer

To merge only the changes from branch2 s file py  make the other changes go away     git checkout -B wip branch2 git read-tree branch1 git checkout branch2 file py git commit -m merging only file py history from branch2 into branch1  git checkout branch1 git merge wip   Merge will never even look at any other file   You might need to  -f  the checkouts if the trees are different enough   Note that this will leave branch1 looking as if everything in branch2 s history to that point has been merged  which may not be what you want   A better version of the first checkout above is probably  git checkout -B wip  git merge-base branch1 branch2    in which case the commit message should probably also be   git commit -m merging only   git rev-parse branch2  file py into branch1

User · Answer

You can stash and stash pop the file   git checkout branch1 git checkout branch2 file py git stash git checkout branch1 git stash pop

[git] How to merge specific files from Git branches

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