In git what is the difference between merge --squash and rebase

Question

I m new to git and I m trying to understand the difference between a squash and a rebase   As I understand it you perform a squash when doing a rebase

User · Answer

Let s start by the following example     Now we have 3 options to merge changes of feature branch into master branch      Merge commits Will keep all commits history of the feature branch and move them into the master branch Will add extra dummy commit  Rebase and merge Will append all commits history of the feature branch in the front of the master branch Will NOT add extra dummy commit  Squash and merge Will group all feature branch commits into one commit then append it in the front of the master branch Will add extra dummy commit    You can find below how the master branch will look after each one of them     In all cases  We can safely DELETE the feature branch

User · Answer

Merge squash merges a tree  a sequence of commits  into a single commit  That is  it squashes all changes made in n commits into a single commit   Rebasing is re-basing  that is  choosing a new base  parent commit  for a tree  Maybe the mercurial term for this is more clear  they call it transplant because it s just that  picking a new ground  parent commit  root  for a tree   When doing an interactive rebase  you re given the option to either squash  pick  edit or skip the commits you are going to rebase   Hope that was clear

User · Answer

Merge commits  retains all of the commits in your branch and interleaves them with commits on the base branch  Merge Squash  retains the changes but omits the individual commits from history   Rebase  This moves the entire feature branch to begin on the tip of the master branch  effectively incorporating all of the new commits in master    More on here

User · Answer

Both git merge --squash and git rebase --interactive can produce a  squashed  commit  But they serve different purposes    git merge --squash abranch   will produce a squashed commit on the destination branch  without marking any merge relationship   Note  it does not produce a commit right away  you need an additional git commit -m  squash branch   This is useful if you want to throw away the source branch completely  going from  schema taken from SO question     git checkout stable        X                   stable                           a---b---c---d---e---f---g tmp   to   git merge --squash tmp git commit -m  squash tmp         X-------------------G stable                           a---b---c---d---e---f---g tmp   and then deleting tmp branch     Note  git merge has a --commit option  but it cannot be used with --squash  It was never possible to use --commit and --squash together  Since Git 2 22 1  Q3 2019   this incompatibility is made explicit   See commit 1d14d0c  24 May 2019  by Vishal Verma  reloadbrain    Merged by Junio C Hamano -- gitster -- in commit 33f2790  25 Jul 2019        merge  refuse --commit with --squash      Previously  when --squash was supplied   option commit  was silently   dropped  This could have been surprising to a user who tried to override   the no-commit behavior of squash using --commit explicitly    git git builtin merge c cmd merge   now includes   if  option commit  gt  0      die    You cannot combine --squash with --commit           git rebase --interactive   replays some or all of your commits on a new base  allowing you to squash  or more recently  fix up   see this SO question   going directly to   git checkout tmp git rebase -i stable        stable       X-------------------G tmp                             a---b   If you choose to squash all commits of tmp  but  contrary to merge --squash  you can choose to replay some  and squashing others      So the differences are    squash does not touch your source branch  tmp here  and creates a single commit where you want  rebase allows you to go on on the same source branch  still tmp  with    a new base a cleaner history

[git] In git, what is the difference between merge --squash and rebase?

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