b2d95e3fb97da646fb5565a47bc66ee2035b6d1f
   1git-rebase(1)
   2=============
   3
   4NAME
   5----
   6git-rebase - Reapply commits on top of another base tip
   7
   8SYNOPSIS
   9--------
  10[verse]
  11'git rebase' [-i | --interactive] [<options>] [--exec <cmd>] [--onto <newbase>]
  12        [<upstream> [<branch>]]
  13'git rebase' [-i | --interactive] [<options>] [--exec <cmd>] [--onto <newbase>]
  14        --root [<branch>]
  15'git rebase' --continue | --skip | --abort | --quit | --edit-todo | --show-current-patch
  16
  17DESCRIPTION
  18-----------
  19If <branch> is specified, 'git rebase' will perform an automatic
  20`git checkout <branch>` before doing anything else.  Otherwise
  21it remains on the current branch.
  22
  23If <upstream> is not specified, the upstream configured in
  24branch.<name>.remote and branch.<name>.merge options will be used (see
  25linkgit:git-config[1] for details) and the `--fork-point` option is
  26assumed.  If you are currently not on any branch or if the current
  27branch does not have a configured upstream, the rebase will abort.
  28
  29All changes made by commits in the current branch but that are not
  30in <upstream> are saved to a temporary area.  This is the same set
  31of commits that would be shown by `git log <upstream>..HEAD`; or by
  32`git log 'fork_point'..HEAD`, if `--fork-point` is active (see the
  33description on `--fork-point` below); or by `git log HEAD`, if the
  34`--root` option is specified.
  35
  36The current branch is reset to <upstream>, or <newbase> if the
  37--onto option was supplied.  This has the exact same effect as
  38`git reset --hard <upstream>` (or <newbase>).  ORIG_HEAD is set
  39to point at the tip of the branch before the reset.
  40
  41The commits that were previously saved into the temporary area are
  42then reapplied to the current branch, one by one, in order. Note that
  43any commits in HEAD which introduce the same textual changes as a commit
  44in HEAD..<upstream> are omitted (i.e., a patch already accepted upstream
  45with a different commit message or timestamp will be skipped).
  46
  47It is possible that a merge failure will prevent this process from being
  48completely automatic.  You will have to resolve any such merge failure
  49and run `git rebase --continue`.  Another option is to bypass the commit
  50that caused the merge failure with `git rebase --skip`.  To check out the
  51original <branch> and remove the .git/rebase-apply working files, use the
  52command `git rebase --abort` instead.
  53
  54Assume the following history exists and the current branch is "topic":
  55
  56------------
  57          A---B---C topic
  58         /
  59    D---E---F---G master
  60------------
  61
  62From this point, the result of either of the following commands:
  63
  64
  65    git rebase master
  66    git rebase master topic
  67
  68would be:
  69
  70------------
  71                  A'--B'--C' topic
  72                 /
  73    D---E---F---G master
  74------------
  75
  76*NOTE:* The latter form is just a short-hand of `git checkout topic`
  77followed by `git rebase master`. When rebase exits `topic` will
  78remain the checked-out branch.
  79
  80If the upstream branch already contains a change you have made (e.g.,
  81because you mailed a patch which was applied upstream), then that commit
  82will be skipped. For example, running `git rebase master` on the
  83following history (in which `A'` and `A` introduce the same set of changes,
  84but have different committer information):
  85
  86------------
  87          A---B---C topic
  88         /
  89    D---E---A'---F master
  90------------
  91
  92will result in:
  93
  94------------
  95                   B'---C' topic
  96                  /
  97    D---E---A'---F master
  98------------
  99
 100Here is how you would transplant a topic branch based on one
 101branch to another, to pretend that you forked the topic branch
 102from the latter branch, using `rebase --onto`.
 103
 104First let's assume your 'topic' is based on branch 'next'.
 105For example, a feature developed in 'topic' depends on some
 106functionality which is found in 'next'.
 107
 108------------
 109    o---o---o---o---o  master
 110         \
 111          o---o---o---o---o  next
 112                           \
 113                            o---o---o  topic
 114------------
 115
 116We want to make 'topic' forked from branch 'master'; for example,
 117because the functionality on which 'topic' depends was merged into the
 118more stable 'master' branch. We want our tree to look like this:
 119
 120------------
 121    o---o---o---o---o  master
 122        |            \
 123        |             o'--o'--o'  topic
 124         \
 125          o---o---o---o---o  next
 126------------
 127
 128We can get this using the following command:
 129
 130    git rebase --onto master next topic
 131
 132
 133Another example of --onto option is to rebase part of a
 134branch.  If we have the following situation:
 135
 136------------
 137                            H---I---J topicB
 138                           /
 139                  E---F---G  topicA
 140                 /
 141    A---B---C---D  master
 142------------
 143
 144then the command
 145
 146    git rebase --onto master topicA topicB
 147
 148would result in:
 149
 150------------
 151                 H'--I'--J'  topicB
 152                /
 153                | E---F---G  topicA
 154                |/
 155    A---B---C---D  master
 156------------
 157
 158This is useful when topicB does not depend on topicA.
 159
 160A range of commits could also be removed with rebase.  If we have
 161the following situation:
 162
 163------------
 164    E---F---G---H---I---J  topicA
 165------------
 166
 167then the command
 168
 169    git rebase --onto topicA~5 topicA~3 topicA
 170
 171would result in the removal of commits F and G:
 172
 173------------
 174    E---H'---I'---J'  topicA
 175------------
 176
 177This is useful if F and G were flawed in some way, or should not be
 178part of topicA.  Note that the argument to --onto and the <upstream>
 179parameter can be any valid commit-ish.
 180
 181In case of conflict, 'git rebase' will stop at the first problematic commit
 182and leave conflict markers in the tree.  You can use 'git diff' to locate
 183the markers (<<<<<<) and make edits to resolve the conflict.  For each
 184file you edit, you need to tell Git that the conflict has been resolved,
 185typically this would be done with
 186
 187
 188    git add <filename>
 189
 190
 191After resolving the conflict manually and updating the index with the
 192desired resolution, you can continue the rebasing process with
 193
 194
 195    git rebase --continue
 196
 197
 198Alternatively, you can undo the 'git rebase' with
 199
 200
 201    git rebase --abort
 202
 203CONFIGURATION
 204-------------
 205
 206include::rebase-config.txt[]
 207
 208OPTIONS
 209-------
 210--onto <newbase>::
 211        Starting point at which to create the new commits. If the
 212        --onto option is not specified, the starting point is
 213        <upstream>.  May be any valid commit, and not just an
 214        existing branch name.
 215+
 216As a special case, you may use "A\...B" as a shortcut for the
 217merge base of A and B if there is exactly one merge base. You can
 218leave out at most one of A and B, in which case it defaults to HEAD.
 219
 220<upstream>::
 221        Upstream branch to compare against.  May be any valid commit,
 222        not just an existing branch name. Defaults to the configured
 223        upstream for the current branch.
 224
 225<branch>::
 226        Working branch; defaults to HEAD.
 227
 228--continue::
 229        Restart the rebasing process after having resolved a merge conflict.
 230
 231--abort::
 232        Abort the rebase operation and reset HEAD to the original
 233        branch. If <branch> was provided when the rebase operation was
 234        started, then HEAD will be reset to <branch>. Otherwise HEAD
 235        will be reset to where it was when the rebase operation was
 236        started.
 237
 238--quit::
 239        Abort the rebase operation but HEAD is not reset back to the
 240        original branch. The index and working tree are also left
 241        unchanged as a result.
 242
 243--keep-empty::
 244        Keep the commits that do not change anything from its
 245        parents in the result.
 246+
 247See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 248
 249--allow-empty-message::
 250        By default, rebasing commits with an empty message will fail.
 251        This option overrides that behavior, allowing commits with empty
 252        messages to be rebased.
 253+
 254See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 255
 256--skip::
 257        Restart the rebasing process by skipping the current patch.
 258
 259--edit-todo::
 260        Edit the todo list during an interactive rebase.
 261
 262--show-current-patch::
 263        Show the current patch in an interactive rebase or when rebase
 264        is stopped because of conflicts. This is the equivalent of
 265        `git show REBASE_HEAD`.
 266
 267-m::
 268--merge::
 269        Use merging strategies to rebase.  When the recursive (default) merge
 270        strategy is used, this allows rebase to be aware of renames on the
 271        upstream side.
 272+
 273Note that a rebase merge works by replaying each commit from the working
 274branch on top of the <upstream> branch.  Because of this, when a merge
 275conflict happens, the side reported as 'ours' is the so-far rebased
 276series, starting with <upstream>, and 'theirs' is the working branch.  In
 277other words, the sides are swapped.
 278+
 279See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 280
 281-s <strategy>::
 282--strategy=<strategy>::
 283        Use the given merge strategy.
 284        If there is no `-s` option 'git merge-recursive' is used
 285        instead.  This implies --merge.
 286+
 287Because 'git rebase' replays each commit from the working branch
 288on top of the <upstream> branch using the given strategy, using
 289the 'ours' strategy simply empties all patches from the <branch>,
 290which makes little sense.
 291+
 292See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 293
 294-X <strategy-option>::
 295--strategy-option=<strategy-option>::
 296        Pass the <strategy-option> through to the merge strategy.
 297        This implies `--merge` and, if no strategy has been
 298        specified, `-s recursive`.  Note the reversal of 'ours' and
 299        'theirs' as noted above for the `-m` option.
 300+
 301See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 302
 303-S[<keyid>]::
 304--gpg-sign[=<keyid>]::
 305        GPG-sign commits. The `keyid` argument is optional and
 306        defaults to the committer identity; if specified, it must be
 307        stuck to the option without a space.
 308
 309-q::
 310--quiet::
 311        Be quiet. Implies --no-stat.
 312
 313-v::
 314--verbose::
 315        Be verbose. Implies --stat.
 316
 317--stat::
 318        Show a diffstat of what changed upstream since the last rebase. The
 319        diffstat is also controlled by the configuration option rebase.stat.
 320
 321-n::
 322--no-stat::
 323        Do not show a diffstat as part of the rebase process.
 324
 325--no-verify::
 326        This option bypasses the pre-rebase hook.  See also linkgit:githooks[5].
 327
 328--verify::
 329        Allows the pre-rebase hook to run, which is the default.  This option can
 330        be used to override --no-verify.  See also linkgit:githooks[5].
 331
 332-C<n>::
 333        Ensure at least <n> lines of surrounding context match before
 334        and after each change.  When fewer lines of surrounding
 335        context exist they all must match.  By default no context is
 336        ever ignored.
 337+
 338See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 339
 340-f::
 341--force-rebase::
 342        Force a rebase even if the current branch is up to date and
 343        the command without `--force` would return without doing anything.
 344+
 345You may find this (or --no-ff with an interactive rebase) helpful after
 346reverting a topic branch merge, as this option recreates the topic branch with
 347fresh commits so it can be remerged successfully without needing to "revert
 348the reversion" (see the
 349link:howto/revert-a-faulty-merge.html[revert-a-faulty-merge How-To] for details).
 350
 351--fork-point::
 352--no-fork-point::
 353        Use reflog to find a better common ancestor between <upstream>
 354        and <branch> when calculating which commits have been
 355        introduced by <branch>.
 356+
 357When --fork-point is active, 'fork_point' will be used instead of
 358<upstream> to calculate the set of commits to rebase, where
 359'fork_point' is the result of `git merge-base --fork-point <upstream>
 360<branch>` command (see linkgit:git-merge-base[1]).  If 'fork_point'
 361ends up being empty, the <upstream> will be used as a fallback.
 362+
 363If either <upstream> or --root is given on the command line, then the
 364default is `--no-fork-point`, otherwise the default is `--fork-point`.
 365
 366--ignore-whitespace::
 367--whitespace=<option>::
 368        These flag are passed to the 'git apply' program
 369        (see linkgit:git-apply[1]) that applies the patch.
 370+
 371See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 372
 373--committer-date-is-author-date::
 374--ignore-date::
 375        These flags are passed to 'git am' to easily change the dates
 376        of the rebased commits (see linkgit:git-am[1]).
 377+
 378See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 379
 380--signoff::
 381        Add a Signed-off-by: trailer to all the rebased commits. Note
 382        that if `--interactive` is given then only commits marked to be
 383        picked, edited or reworded will have the trailer added.
 384+
 385See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 386
 387-i::
 388--interactive::
 389        Make a list of the commits which are about to be rebased.  Let the
 390        user edit that list before rebasing.  This mode can also be used to
 391        split commits (see SPLITTING COMMITS below).
 392+
 393The commit list format can be changed by setting the configuration option
 394rebase.instructionFormat.  A customized instruction format will automatically
 395have the long commit hash prepended to the format.
 396+
 397See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 398
 399-r::
 400--rebase-merges[=(rebase-cousins|no-rebase-cousins)]::
 401        By default, a rebase will simply drop merge commits from the todo
 402        list, and put the rebased commits into a single, linear branch.
 403        With `--rebase-merges`, the rebase will instead try to preserve
 404        the branching structure within the commits that are to be rebased,
 405        by recreating the merge commits. Any resolved merge conflicts or
 406        manual amendments in these merge commits will have to be
 407        resolved/re-applied manually.
 408+
 409By default, or when `no-rebase-cousins` was specified, commits which do not
 410have `<upstream>` as direct ancestor will keep their original branch point,
 411i.e. commits that would be excluded by gitlink:git-log[1]'s
 412`--ancestry-path` option will keep their original ancestry by default. If
 413the `rebase-cousins` mode is turned on, such commits are instead rebased
 414onto `<upstream>` (or `<onto>`, if specified).
 415+
 416The `--rebase-merges` mode is similar in spirit to `--preserve-merges`, but
 417in contrast to that option works well in interactive rebases: commits can be
 418reordered, inserted and dropped at will.
 419+
 420It is currently only possible to recreate the merge commits using the
 421`recursive` merge strategy; Different merge strategies can be used only via
 422explicit `exec git merge -s <strategy> [...]` commands.
 423+
 424See also REBASING MERGES and INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 425
 426-p::
 427--preserve-merges::
 428        Recreate merge commits instead of flattening the history by replaying
 429        commits a merge commit introduces. Merge conflict resolutions or manual
 430        amendments to merge commits are not preserved.
 431+
 432This uses the `--interactive` machinery internally, but combining it
 433with the `--interactive` option explicitly is generally not a good
 434idea unless you know what you are doing (see BUGS below).
 435+
 436See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 437
 438-x <cmd>::
 439--exec <cmd>::
 440        Append "exec <cmd>" after each line creating a commit in the
 441        final history. <cmd> will be interpreted as one or more shell
 442        commands.
 443+
 444You may execute several commands by either using one instance of `--exec`
 445with several commands:
 446+
 447        git rebase -i --exec "cmd1 && cmd2 && ..."
 448+
 449or by giving more than one `--exec`:
 450+
 451        git rebase -i --exec "cmd1" --exec "cmd2" --exec ...
 452+
 453If `--autosquash` is used, "exec" lines will not be appended for
 454the intermediate commits, and will only appear at the end of each
 455squash/fixup series.
 456+
 457This uses the `--interactive` machinery internally, but it can be run
 458without an explicit `--interactive`.
 459+
 460See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 461
 462--root::
 463        Rebase all commits reachable from <branch>, instead of
 464        limiting them with an <upstream>.  This allows you to rebase
 465        the root commit(s) on a branch.  When used with --onto, it
 466        will skip changes already contained in <newbase> (instead of
 467        <upstream>) whereas without --onto it will operate on every change.
 468        When used together with both --onto and --preserve-merges,
 469        'all' root commits will be rewritten to have <newbase> as parent
 470        instead.
 471+
 472See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 473
 474--autosquash::
 475--no-autosquash::
 476        When the commit log message begins with "squash! ..." (or
 477        "fixup! ..."), and there is already a commit in the todo list that
 478        matches the same `...`, automatically modify the todo list of rebase
 479        -i so that the commit marked for squashing comes right after the
 480        commit to be modified, and change the action of the moved commit
 481        from `pick` to `squash` (or `fixup`).  A commit matches the `...` if
 482        the commit subject matches, or if the `...` refers to the commit's
 483        hash. As a fall-back, partial matches of the commit subject work,
 484        too.  The recommended way to create fixup/squash commits is by using
 485        the `--fixup`/`--squash` options of linkgit:git-commit[1].
 486+
 487If the `--autosquash` option is enabled by default using the
 488configuration variable `rebase.autoSquash`, this option can be
 489used to override and disable this setting.
 490+
 491See also INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS below.
 492
 493--autostash::
 494--no-autostash::
 495        Automatically create a temporary stash entry before the operation
 496        begins, and apply it after the operation ends.  This means
 497        that you can run rebase on a dirty worktree.  However, use
 498        with care: the final stash application after a successful
 499        rebase might result in non-trivial conflicts.
 500
 501--no-ff::
 502        With --interactive, cherry-pick all rebased commits instead of
 503        fast-forwarding over the unchanged ones.  This ensures that the
 504        entire history of the rebased branch is composed of new commits.
 505+
 506Without --interactive, this is a synonym for --force-rebase.
 507+
 508You may find this helpful after reverting a topic branch merge, as this option
 509recreates the topic branch with fresh commits so it can be remerged
 510successfully without needing to "revert the reversion" (see the
 511link:howto/revert-a-faulty-merge.html[revert-a-faulty-merge How-To] for details).
 512
 513INCOMPATIBLE OPTIONS
 514--------------------
 515
 516git-rebase has many flags that are incompatible with each other,
 517predominantly due to the fact that it has three different underlying
 518implementations:
 519
 520 * one based on linkgit:git-am[1] (the default)
 521 * one based on git-merge-recursive (merge backend)
 522 * one based on linkgit:git-cherry-pick[1] (interactive backend)
 523
 524Flags only understood by the am backend:
 525
 526 * --committer-date-is-author-date
 527 * --ignore-date
 528 * --whitespace
 529 * --ignore-whitespace
 530 * -C
 531
 532Flags understood by both merge and interactive backends:
 533
 534 * --merge
 535 * --strategy
 536 * --strategy-option
 537 * --allow-empty-message
 538
 539Flags only understood by the interactive backend:
 540
 541 * --[no-]autosquash
 542 * --rebase-merges
 543 * --preserve-merges
 544 * --interactive
 545 * --exec
 546 * --keep-empty
 547 * --autosquash
 548 * --edit-todo
 549 * --root when used in combination with --onto
 550
 551Other incompatible flag pairs:
 552
 553 * --preserve-merges and --interactive
 554 * --preserve-merges and --signoff
 555 * --preserve-merges and --rebase-merges
 556 * --rebase-merges and --strategy
 557 * --rebase-merges and --strategy-option
 558
 559include::merge-strategies.txt[]
 560
 561NOTES
 562-----
 563
 564You should understand the implications of using 'git rebase' on a
 565repository that you share.  See also RECOVERING FROM UPSTREAM REBASE
 566below.
 567
 568When the git-rebase command is run, it will first execute a "pre-rebase"
 569hook if one exists.  You can use this hook to do sanity checks and
 570reject the rebase if it isn't appropriate.  Please see the template
 571pre-rebase hook script for an example.
 572
 573Upon completion, <branch> will be the current branch.
 574
 575INTERACTIVE MODE
 576----------------
 577
 578Rebasing interactively means that you have a chance to edit the commits
 579which are rebased.  You can reorder the commits, and you can
 580remove them (weeding out bad or otherwise unwanted patches).
 581
 582The interactive mode is meant for this type of workflow:
 583
 5841. have a wonderful idea
 5852. hack on the code
 5863. prepare a series for submission
 5874. submit
 588
 589where point 2. consists of several instances of
 590
 591a) regular use
 592
 593 1. finish something worthy of a commit
 594 2. commit
 595
 596b) independent fixup
 597
 598 1. realize that something does not work
 599 2. fix that
 600 3. commit it
 601
 602Sometimes the thing fixed in b.2. cannot be amended to the not-quite
 603perfect commit it fixes, because that commit is buried deeply in a
 604patch series.  That is exactly what interactive rebase is for: use it
 605after plenty of "a"s and "b"s, by rearranging and editing
 606commits, and squashing multiple commits into one.
 607
 608Start it with the last commit you want to retain as-is:
 609
 610        git rebase -i <after-this-commit>
 611
 612An editor will be fired up with all the commits in your current branch
 613(ignoring merge commits), which come after the given commit.  You can
 614reorder the commits in this list to your heart's content, and you can
 615remove them.  The list looks more or less like this:
 616
 617-------------------------------------------
 618pick deadbee The oneline of this commit
 619pick fa1afe1 The oneline of the next commit
 620...
 621-------------------------------------------
 622
 623The oneline descriptions are purely for your pleasure; 'git rebase' will
 624not look at them but at the commit names ("deadbee" and "fa1afe1" in this
 625example), so do not delete or edit the names.
 626
 627By replacing the command "pick" with the command "edit", you can tell
 628'git rebase' to stop after applying that commit, so that you can edit
 629the files and/or the commit message, amend the commit, and continue
 630rebasing.
 631
 632If you just want to edit the commit message for a commit, replace the
 633command "pick" with the command "reword".
 634
 635To drop a commit, replace the command "pick" with "drop", or just
 636delete the matching line.
 637
 638If you want to fold two or more commits into one, replace the command
 639"pick" for the second and subsequent commits with "squash" or "fixup".
 640If the commits had different authors, the folded commit will be
 641attributed to the author of the first commit.  The suggested commit
 642message for the folded commit is the concatenation of the commit
 643messages of the first commit and of those with the "squash" command,
 644but omits the commit messages of commits with the "fixup" command.
 645
 646'git rebase' will stop when "pick" has been replaced with "edit" or
 647when a command fails due to merge errors. When you are done editing
 648and/or resolving conflicts you can continue with `git rebase --continue`.
 649
 650For example, if you want to reorder the last 5 commits, such that what
 651was HEAD~4 becomes the new HEAD. To achieve that, you would call
 652'git rebase' like this:
 653
 654----------------------
 655$ git rebase -i HEAD~5
 656----------------------
 657
 658And move the first patch to the end of the list.
 659
 660You might want to preserve merges, if you have a history like this:
 661
 662------------------
 663           X
 664            \
 665         A---M---B
 666        /
 667---o---O---P---Q
 668------------------
 669
 670Suppose you want to rebase the side branch starting at "A" to "Q". Make
 671sure that the current HEAD is "B", and call
 672
 673-----------------------------
 674$ git rebase -i -p --onto Q O
 675-----------------------------
 676
 677Reordering and editing commits usually creates untested intermediate
 678steps.  You may want to check that your history editing did not break
 679anything by running a test, or at least recompiling at intermediate
 680points in history by using the "exec" command (shortcut "x").  You may
 681do so by creating a todo list like this one:
 682
 683-------------------------------------------
 684pick deadbee Implement feature XXX
 685fixup f1a5c00 Fix to feature XXX
 686exec make
 687pick c0ffeee The oneline of the next commit
 688edit deadbab The oneline of the commit after
 689exec cd subdir; make test
 690...
 691-------------------------------------------
 692
 693The interactive rebase will stop when a command fails (i.e. exits with
 694non-0 status) to give you an opportunity to fix the problem. You can
 695continue with `git rebase --continue`.
 696
 697The "exec" command launches the command in a shell (the one specified
 698in `$SHELL`, or the default shell if `$SHELL` is not set), so you can
 699use shell features (like "cd", ">", ";" ...). The command is run from
 700the root of the working tree.
 701
 702----------------------------------
 703$ git rebase -i --exec "make test"
 704----------------------------------
 705
 706This command lets you check that intermediate commits are compilable.
 707The todo list becomes like that:
 708
 709--------------------
 710pick 5928aea one
 711exec make test
 712pick 04d0fda two
 713exec make test
 714pick ba46169 three
 715exec make test
 716pick f4593f9 four
 717exec make test
 718--------------------
 719
 720SPLITTING COMMITS
 721-----------------
 722
 723In interactive mode, you can mark commits with the action "edit".  However,
 724this does not necessarily mean that 'git rebase' expects the result of this
 725edit to be exactly one commit.  Indeed, you can undo the commit, or you can
 726add other commits.  This can be used to split a commit into two:
 727
 728- Start an interactive rebase with `git rebase -i <commit>^`, where
 729  <commit> is the commit you want to split.  In fact, any commit range
 730  will do, as long as it contains that commit.
 731
 732- Mark the commit you want to split with the action "edit".
 733
 734- When it comes to editing that commit, execute `git reset HEAD^`.  The
 735  effect is that the HEAD is rewound by one, and the index follows suit.
 736  However, the working tree stays the same.
 737
 738- Now add the changes to the index that you want to have in the first
 739  commit.  You can use `git add` (possibly interactively) or
 740  'git gui' (or both) to do that.
 741
 742- Commit the now-current index with whatever commit message is appropriate
 743  now.
 744
 745- Repeat the last two steps until your working tree is clean.
 746
 747- Continue the rebase with `git rebase --continue`.
 748
 749If you are not absolutely sure that the intermediate revisions are
 750consistent (they compile, pass the testsuite, etc.) you should use
 751'git stash' to stash away the not-yet-committed changes
 752after each commit, test, and amend the commit if fixes are necessary.
 753
 754
 755RECOVERING FROM UPSTREAM REBASE
 756-------------------------------
 757
 758Rebasing (or any other form of rewriting) a branch that others have
 759based work on is a bad idea: anyone downstream of it is forced to
 760manually fix their history.  This section explains how to do the fix
 761from the downstream's point of view.  The real fix, however, would be
 762to avoid rebasing the upstream in the first place.
 763
 764To illustrate, suppose you are in a situation where someone develops a
 765'subsystem' branch, and you are working on a 'topic' that is dependent
 766on this 'subsystem'.  You might end up with a history like the
 767following:
 768
 769------------
 770    o---o---o---o---o---o---o---o  master
 771         \
 772          o---o---o---o---o  subsystem
 773                           \
 774                            *---*---*  topic
 775------------
 776
 777If 'subsystem' is rebased against 'master', the following happens:
 778
 779------------
 780    o---o---o---o---o---o---o---o  master
 781         \                       \
 782          o---o---o---o---o       o'--o'--o'--o'--o'  subsystem
 783                           \
 784                            *---*---*  topic
 785------------
 786
 787If you now continue development as usual, and eventually merge 'topic'
 788to 'subsystem', the commits from 'subsystem' will remain duplicated forever:
 789
 790------------
 791    o---o---o---o---o---o---o---o  master
 792         \                       \
 793          o---o---o---o---o       o'--o'--o'--o'--o'--M  subsystem
 794                           \                         /
 795                            *---*---*-..........-*--*  topic
 796------------
 797
 798Such duplicates are generally frowned upon because they clutter up
 799history, making it harder to follow.  To clean things up, you need to
 800transplant the commits on 'topic' to the new 'subsystem' tip, i.e.,
 801rebase 'topic'.  This becomes a ripple effect: anyone downstream from
 802'topic' is forced to rebase too, and so on!
 803
 804There are two kinds of fixes, discussed in the following subsections:
 805
 806Easy case: The changes are literally the same.::
 807
 808        This happens if the 'subsystem' rebase was a simple rebase and
 809        had no conflicts.
 810
 811Hard case: The changes are not the same.::
 812
 813        This happens if the 'subsystem' rebase had conflicts, or used
 814        `--interactive` to omit, edit, squash, or fixup commits; or
 815        if the upstream used one of `commit --amend`, `reset`, or
 816        `filter-branch`.
 817
 818
 819The easy case
 820~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 821
 822Only works if the changes (patch IDs based on the diff contents) on
 823'subsystem' are literally the same before and after the rebase
 824'subsystem' did.
 825
 826In that case, the fix is easy because 'git rebase' knows to skip
 827changes that are already present in the new upstream.  So if you say
 828(assuming you're on 'topic')
 829------------
 830    $ git rebase subsystem
 831------------
 832you will end up with the fixed history
 833------------
 834    o---o---o---o---o---o---o---o  master
 835                                 \
 836                                  o'--o'--o'--o'--o'  subsystem
 837                                                   \
 838                                                    *---*---*  topic
 839------------
 840
 841
 842The hard case
 843~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 844
 845Things get more complicated if the 'subsystem' changes do not exactly
 846correspond to the ones before the rebase.
 847
 848NOTE: While an "easy case recovery" sometimes appears to be successful
 849      even in the hard case, it may have unintended consequences.  For
 850      example, a commit that was removed via `git rebase
 851      --interactive` will be **resurrected**!
 852
 853The idea is to manually tell 'git rebase' "where the old 'subsystem'
 854ended and your 'topic' began", that is, what the old merge-base
 855between them was.  You will have to find a way to name the last commit
 856of the old 'subsystem', for example:
 857
 858* With the 'subsystem' reflog: after 'git fetch', the old tip of
 859  'subsystem' is at `subsystem@{1}`.  Subsequent fetches will
 860  increase the number.  (See linkgit:git-reflog[1].)
 861
 862* Relative to the tip of 'topic': knowing that your 'topic' has three
 863  commits, the old tip of 'subsystem' must be `topic~3`.
 864
 865You can then transplant the old `subsystem..topic` to the new tip by
 866saying (for the reflog case, and assuming you are on 'topic' already):
 867------------
 868    $ git rebase --onto subsystem subsystem@{1}
 869------------
 870
 871The ripple effect of a "hard case" recovery is especially bad:
 872'everyone' downstream from 'topic' will now have to perform a "hard
 873case" recovery too!
 874
 875REBASING MERGES
 876-----------------
 877
 878The interactive rebase command was originally designed to handle
 879individual patch series. As such, it makes sense to exclude merge
 880commits from the todo list, as the developer may have merged the
 881then-current `master` while working on the branch, only to rebase
 882all the commits onto `master` eventually (skipping the merge
 883commits).
 884
 885However, there are legitimate reasons why a developer may want to
 886recreate merge commits: to keep the branch structure (or "commit
 887topology") when working on multiple, inter-related branches.
 888
 889In the following example, the developer works on a topic branch that
 890refactors the way buttons are defined, and on another topic branch
 891that uses that refactoring to implement a "Report a bug" button. The
 892output of `git log --graph --format=%s -5` may look like this:
 893
 894------------
 895*   Merge branch 'report-a-bug'
 896|\
 897| * Add the feedback button
 898* | Merge branch 'refactor-button'
 899|\ \
 900| |/
 901| * Use the Button class for all buttons
 902| * Extract a generic Button class from the DownloadButton one
 903------------
 904
 905The developer might want to rebase those commits to a newer `master`
 906while keeping the branch topology, for example when the first topic
 907branch is expected to be integrated into `master` much earlier than the
 908second one, say, to resolve merge conflicts with changes to the
 909DownloadButton class that made it into `master`.
 910
 911This rebase can be performed using the `--rebase-merges` option.
 912It will generate a todo list looking like this:
 913
 914------------
 915label onto
 916
 917# Branch: refactor-button
 918reset onto
 919pick 123456 Extract a generic Button class from the DownloadButton one
 920pick 654321 Use the Button class for all buttons
 921label refactor-button
 922
 923# Branch: report-a-bug
 924reset refactor-button # Use the Button class for all buttons
 925pick abcdef Add the feedback button
 926label report-a-bug
 927
 928reset onto
 929merge -C a1b2c3 refactor-button # Merge 'refactor-button'
 930merge -C 6f5e4d report-a-bug # Merge 'report-a-bug'
 931------------
 932
 933In contrast to a regular interactive rebase, there are `label`, `reset`
 934and `merge` commands in addition to `pick` ones.
 935
 936The `label` command associates a label with the current HEAD when that
 937command is executed. These labels are created as worktree-local refs
 938(`refs/rewritten/<label>`) that will be deleted when the rebase
 939finishes. That way, rebase operations in multiple worktrees linked to
 940the same repository do not interfere with one another. If the `label`
 941command fails, it is rescheduled immediately, with a helpful message how
 942to proceed.
 943
 944The `reset` command resets the HEAD, index and worktree to the specified
 945revision. It is isimilar to an `exec git reset --hard <label>`, but
 946refuses to overwrite untracked files. If the `reset` command fails, it is
 947rescheduled immediately, with a helpful message how to edit the todo list
 948(this typically happens when a `reset` command was inserted into the todo
 949list manually and contains a typo).
 950
 951The `merge` command will merge the specified revision into whatever is
 952HEAD at that time. With `-C <original-commit>`, the commit message of
 953the specified merge commit will be used. When the `-C` is changed to
 954a lower-case `-c`, the message will be opened in an editor after a
 955successful merge so that the user can edit the message.
 956
 957If a `merge` command fails for any reason other than merge conflicts (i.e.
 958when the merge operation did not even start), it is rescheduled immediately.
 959
 960At this time, the `merge` command will *always* use the `recursive`
 961merge strategy, with no way to choose a different one. To work around
 962this, an `exec` command can be used to call `git merge` explicitly,
 963using the fact that the labels are worktree-local refs (the ref
 964`refs/rewritten/onto` would correspond to the label `onto`, for example).
 965
 966Note: the first command (`label onto`) labels the revision onto which
 967the commits are rebased; The name `onto` is just a convention, as a nod
 968to the `--onto` option.
 969
 970It is also possible to introduce completely new merge commits from scratch
 971by adding a command of the form `merge <merge-head>`. This form will
 972generate a tentative commit message and always open an editor to let the
 973user edit it. This can be useful e.g. when a topic branch turns out to
 974address more than a single concern and wants to be split into two or
 975even more topic branches. Consider this todo list:
 976
 977------------
 978pick 192837 Switch from GNU Makefiles to CMake
 979pick 5a6c7e Document the switch to CMake
 980pick 918273 Fix detection of OpenSSL in CMake
 981pick afbecd http: add support for TLS v1.3
 982pick fdbaec Fix detection of cURL in CMake on Windows
 983------------
 984
 985The one commit in this list that is not related to CMake may very well
 986have been motivated by working on fixing all those bugs introduced by
 987switching to CMake, but it addresses a different concern. To split this
 988branch into two topic branches, the todo list could be edited like this:
 989
 990------------
 991label onto
 992
 993pick afbecd http: add support for TLS v1.3
 994label tlsv1.3
 995
 996reset onto
 997pick 192837 Switch from GNU Makefiles to CMake
 998pick 918273 Fix detection of OpenSSL in CMake
 999pick fdbaec Fix detection of cURL in CMake on Windows
1000pick 5a6c7e Document the switch to CMake
1001label cmake
1002
1003reset onto
1004merge tlsv1.3
1005merge cmake
1006------------
1007
1008BUGS
1009----
1010The todo list presented by `--preserve-merges --interactive` does not
1011represent the topology of the revision graph.  Editing commits and
1012rewording their commit messages should work fine, but attempts to
1013reorder commits tend to produce counterintuitive results. Use
1014`--rebase-merges` in such scenarios instead.
1015
1016For example, an attempt to rearrange
1017------------
10181 --- 2 --- 3 --- 4 --- 5
1019------------
1020to
1021------------
10221 --- 2 --- 4 --- 3 --- 5
1023------------
1024by moving the "pick 4" line will result in the following history:
1025------------
1026        3
1027       /
10281 --- 2 --- 4 --- 5
1029------------
1030
1031GIT
1032---
1033Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite