git town compress

git town compress [-m <text> | --message <text>] [-s | --stack] [--dry-run] [-v | --verbose]

The compress command squashes all commits on a branch into a single commit. Git Town compresses feature branches and parked branches if they are currently checked out. It doesn’t compress perennial, observed, and contribution branches.

Branches must be in sync to compress them, so run git town sync and resolve merge conflicts before running this command.

Assuming you have a feature branch with these commits:

$ git log --pretty=format:'%s'
commit 1
commit 2
commit 3

Let’s compress these three commits into a single commit:

git town compress

Now your branch has a single commit with the name of the first commit but containing the changes of all three commits that existed on the branch before:

$ git log --pretty=format:'%s'
commit 1

Options

-m <text>
--message <text>

By default the now compressed commit uses the commit message of the first commit in the branch. You can provide a custom commit message for the squashed commit with the --message <message> aka -m flag, which works similar to the -m flag for git commit.

Assuming you have a feature branch with these commits:

$ git log --pretty=format:'%s'
commit 1
commit 2
commit 3

Let’s compress these three commits into a single commit:

git town compress -m "compressed commit"

Now your branch has these commits:

$ git log --pretty=format:'%s'
compressed commit

The new compressed commit now contains the changes from the old commit 1, commit 2, and commit 3.

-s
--stack

To compress all branches in a branch stack provide the --stack aka -s switch.

If you want to compress your commits every time you sync, choose the compress sync strategy for the respective branch type.

Assuming you have a stacked change consisting of two feature branches. Each branch contains three commits.

main
 \
  branch-1
  |  * commit 1a
  |  * commit 1b
  |  * commit 1c
  branch-2
     * commit 2a
     * commit 2b
     * commit 2c

Let’s compress the commits in all branches of this stack:

git town compress --stack

Now your stack contains these branches and commits:

main
 \
  branch-1
  |  * commit 1a
  branch-2
     * commit 2a

As usual, the new commit 1a contains the changes made in branch 1, i.e. the changes from the old commit 1a, commit 1b, and commit 1c. The new commit 2a contains the changes made in branch 2, i.e. the changes from the old commit 2a, commit 2b, and commit 2c.

--dry-run

Use the --dry-run flag to test-drive this command. It prints the Git commands that would be run but doesn’t execute them.

-v
--verbose

The --verbose aka -v flag prints all Git commands run under the hood to determine the repository state.