Git Merging vs Rebase

Article based on: https://www.atlassian.com/git/tutorials/merging-vs-rebasing/the-golden-rule-of-rebasing

Gitflow was in implemented by my team 6 months ago, but I’m not here to talk about it. I like it.

But there is a big problem : History

Git Commit History Problem

Many developers do not have problem with their git repositories, nor the commit history. Merge Commits or Resolved Conflicts Commits isn’t a problem. But in a CI ( Continuous Integration ) workflow, their comments are changelog files.

Example for comments for commits in your repo history :

Merge pull request #001 from feature
Resolved Conflicts for Merge
Fix conflicts
Merge

Rebase

A month ago, we migrate the workflow for Git Rebase in approved pull request. But this is not a simple migration, in Github has a merge button leads to the dark side, for this we have created a small tutorial.

Step-by-step

Step 1 : Get last Hash in Git

You need the last commit hash before your features, as in the figure below:

git log

Step 2: Rebase within your branch

Execute rebase in your branch for create a unique commit for your feature and solve the conflicts. Use “git log” to verify history change.

git rebase -i HASH

Step 3: Update Master Branch ( For me develop)

You need change local branch and pull wall changes.

git checkout develop
git pull

Step 4: Make rebase from master

Change to feature branch and make rebase command for sync with develop ( or master). Push feature branch for Github close pull request.

git checkout feature
git rebase develop
git push origin -f feature

Step 5: Make rebase within master

You need now make rebase in develop ( or master ) to update git history. Do as the same in step 4 but invert master and feature. This is the last step to close a pull request, in my case, the github detect.(Thanks Github!)

git checkout develop
git rebase feature
git push

Conclusion

In big projects your Git, in my case Github, is the heart of your code and software. 5 minutes tor make the history commit better, it’s nothing. I want to thank the Tech Leader of my team (Christopher Morris), who inspired me to create this post. Yes, he likes a clean git.

If you have a better idea, share with me. Thanks!