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How can I make --reset-author the default?
I do a lot of rebasing and amending of my topic branches. I don't think it's especially useful for me or my colleagues to see in the logs what date it was when I first started working on the particular topic - only when I actually submitted it.
I know I can explicitly reset the date of my commit to the current time using git commit --amend --reset-author. But is there any way I can change that behaviour to be the default when I rebase or amend, so I don't have to type it every time?
For example: on Monday I put in a new feature and submit the patch for peer review. On Tuesday, my team lead wants me to make some changes to my patch and resubmit. On Wednesday I make the changes, git commit --amend them, and submit the new patch for review. On Thursday the new changes are approved. I pull the master branch and rebase my changes on it.
Right now, that commit entry in my log will still be timestamped Monday, even though I amended on Wednesday and rebased on Thursday. In the future, when we look through the logs, the useful date is when I've finished and push the change (Thursday), not the date of the first commit that no longer exists (Monday). To update the date, now on Thursday, I need to go a git commit --amend --reset-author --no-edit. If I don't do that, it will still say that my change was on a Monday, when it was not.
(Alternatively: am I missing something here? Is it actually useful for people to know that I started work on the topic on Monday, rather than that the change was actually put in on Thursday? Is there a way to see both the datestamp of a commit and the date the commit was actually added to the tree?)
3 answers
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Here's the problem:
Wednesday I make the changes, git commit --amend them
Just do a normal commit. You are trying to re-write, or cover up, history. That's generally bad.
The record should reflect what really happened: You submitted a patch, it was rejected for xxx reason, you changed the patch, it was accepted. You have no way of knowing what part of that might be useful information a month, a year, or years in the future. The cost is tiny. Do it right.
I haven't altered anything that has been pushed
Actually you are. You are changing the comments for the commit.
It seems the overall problem is that your group uses commit comments poorly, and therefore values them less.
I should be able to read all the drafts, right down to the first one, rather than just the final printed edition
Yes. That's rather the basis of source control. Remember also that this is for the people the write the software, not the public that just uses the software.
The following users marked this post as Works for me:
| User | Comment | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Hyperlynx | (no comment) | Jan 11, 2022 at 02:35 |
You should be able to alias the string to something short. For example, I have
git config --global alias.a 'add .'
git config --global alias.ci commit
and so instead of
git add .
git commit -m'Message'
I can do
git a
git ci -m'Message'
In your case, it would be
git config --global alias.ci 'commit --amend --reset-author'
if I am understanding the question correctly.
Rather that doing git commit --amend --date= every time you commit, you can coalesce commits at merge time using git merge --squash.
That said, for non-trivial topic branches, it is usually valuable to retain the commits in the topic branch to figure out why a particular change was made. For instance, if you are developing a feature in a feature branch, this might require some refactorings, or non-obvious bugfixes, that would be better described in a commit of their own.
In general, I find a detailed and truthful history more valuable than a pretty one: The purpose of history is not to look beautiful, but to be able to figure out why a certain change was made. Yes, unnecessary information may slow the inspection of history, but deleted necessary information will halt it.
PS: You may have noticed that this answer does not mention commit dates. That's because they rarely matter in my experience: When inspecting history, I care about the "what" and "why", not usually the "when". And even when I care about the "when", it'll only be about the year, or the release, not the day. Therefore, the choice of commit frequency or squashing should not be affected by dating considerations.
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