When running git filter-branch
using a newer version of git
(2.22+
maybe?), it says to use this new tool git-filter-repo. This tool certainly simplified things for me.
Commands to create the XYZ
repo from the original question:
# create local clone of original repo in directory XYZ
tmp $ git clone [email protected]:user/original.git XYZ
# switch to working in XYZ
tmp $ cd XYZ
# keep subdirectories XY1 and XY2 (dropping ABC)
XYZ $ git filter-repo --path XY1 --path XY2
# note: original remote origin was dropped
# (protecting against accidental pushes overwriting original repo data)
# XYZ $ ls -1
# XY1
# XY2
# XYZ $ git log --oneline
# last commit modifying ./XY1 or ./XY2
# first commit modifying ./XY1 or ./XY2
# point at new hosted, dedicated repo
XYZ $ git remote add origin [email protected]:user/XYZ.git
# push (and track) remote master
XYZ $ git push -u origin master
assumptions: * remote XYZ repo was new and empty before the push
In my case, I also wanted to move a couple of directories for a more consistent structure. Initially, I ran that simple filter-repo
command followed by git mv dir-to-rename
, but I found I could get a slightly "better" history using the --path-rename
option. Instead of seeing last modified 5 hours ago
on moved files in the new repo I now see last year
(in the GitHub UI), which matches the modified times in the original repo.
Instead of...
git filter-repo --path XY1 --path XY2 --path inconsistent
git mv inconsistent XY3 # which updates last modification time
I ultimately ran...
git filter-repo --path XY1 --path XY2 --path inconsistent --path-rename inconsistent:XY3
Notes:
git filter-repo --subdirectory-filter dir-matching-new-repo-name
). That command correctly converted that subdirectory to the root of the copied local repo, but it also resulted in a history of only the three commits it took to create the subdirectory. (I hadn't realized that --path
could be specified multiple times; thereby, obviating the need to create a subdirectory in the source repo.) Since someone had committed to the source repo by the time I noticed that I'd failed to carry forward the history, I just used git reset commit-before-subdir-move --hard
after the clone
command, and added --force
to the filter-repo
command to get it to operate on the slightly modified local clone.git clone ...
git reset HEAD~7 --hard # roll back before mistake
git filter-repo ... --force # tell filter-repo the alterations are expected
git
, but ultimately I cloned git-filter-repo and symlinked it to $(git --exec-path)
:ln -s ~/github/newren/git-filter-repo/git-filter-repo $(git --exec-path)