How can I list all commits that changed a specific file

Question

Is there a way to list all commits that changed a specific file

User · Answer

On Linux you can use gitk for this   It can be installed using  sudo apt-get install git-gui gitk   It can be used to see commits of a specific file by  gitk  lt Filename

User · Answer

To just get a list of the commit hashes use git rev-list   git rev-list HEAD  lt filename gt    Output   b7c4f0d7ebc3e4c61155c76b5ebc940e697600b1 e3920ac6c08a4502d1c27cea157750bd978b6443 ea62422870ea51ef21d1629420c6441927b0d3ea 4b1eb462b74c309053909ab83451e42a7239c0db 4df2b0b581e55f3d41381f035c0c2c9bd31ee98d   which means 5 commits have touched this file  It s reverse chronological order  so the first commit in the list b7c4f0d7 is the most recent one

User · Answer

git log path should do what you want  From the git log man    --   lt path gt      Show only commits that affect any of the specified paths  To prevent confusion with  options and branch names  paths may need to be prefixed with  --   to separate them from options or refnames

User · Answer

If you wish to see all changes made in commits that changed a particular file  rather than just the changes to the file itself   you can pass --full-diff   git log -p --full-diff  branch  --  lt path gt

User · Answer

Shows commit history with patch git log -p - lt no of commits gt  --follow  lt file name gt     Shows brief details like  1 file changed  6 insertions     1 deletion -   git log --stat --follow  lt file name gt    Reference

User · Answer

If you want to look for all commits by filename and not by filepath  use   git log --all --    wmv

User · Answer

gitk  lt path to filename gt    Assuming the package  gitk  is already installed   If it is not installed  do this   sudo apt-get install gitk   And then try the above command  It is for Linux    It might help Linux users if they want a GUI

User · Answer

It should be as simple as git log  lt somepath gt   check the manpage  git-log 1     Personally I like to use git log --stat  lt path gt  so I can see the impact of each commit on the file

User · Answer

Alternatively  since Git 1 8 4   it is also possible to just get all the commits which has changed a specific part of a file  You can get this by passing the starting line and the ending line number   The result returned would be the list of commits that modified this particular part  The command goes like   git log --pretty short -u -L  lt upperLimit gt   lt lowerLimit gt   lt path to filename gt    where upperLimit is the start line number and lowerLimit is the ending line number  More Info - https   www techpurohit com list-some-useful-git-commands

User · Answer

As jackrabb1t pointed out  --follow is more robust since it continues listing the history beyond renames moves  So  if you are looking for a file that is not currently in the same path or a file that has been renamed throughout various commits  --follow will track it   This can be a better option if you want to visualize the name path changes   git log --follow --name-status --  lt path gt    But if you want a more compact list with only what matters   git log --follow --name-status --format   H  --  lt path gt    or even  git log --follow --name-only --format   H  --  lt path gt    The downside is that --follow only works for a single file

User · Answer

Use the command below to get commits for a specific file   git log -p filename

User · Answer

I have been looking at this closely and all these answers don   t seem to really show me all the commits across all the branches   Here is what I have come up with by messing around with the gitk edit view options  This shows me all the commits for a file regardless of branch  local  reflog  and remote   gitk --all --first-parent --remotes --reflog --author-date-order -- filename   It also works with git log   git log --all --first-parent --remotes --reflog --author-date-order -- filename

User · Answer

If you are trying to --follow a file deleted in a previous commit use  git log --follow -- filename

User · Answer

If you want to view all the commits that changed a file  in all the branches  use this   git log --follow --all  lt filepath gt

User · Answer

The --follow works for a particular file  git log --follow -- filename   Difference to other solutions given  Note that other solutions include git log path  without the --follow   That approach is handy if you want to track e g  changes in a directory  but stumbles when files were renamed  thus use --follow filename

User · Answer

Use git log --all  lt filename gt  to view the commits influencing  lt filename gt  in all branches

[git] How can I list all commits that changed a specific file?

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