Re: [boost] [git] Mess with branches

Subject: Re: [boost] [git] Mess with branches
From: Antony Polukhin (antoshkka_at_[hidden])
Date: 2013-12-04 08:48:06

2013/12/3 Daniel Pfeifer <daniel_at_[hidden]>
<...>

> The boost superproject references the branches 'master' and 'develop'
> plus the tags.
> Apart from these, you are free to remove branches.
>

Just in case someone will be interested in how to remove branches with an
ability to restore the branch and without making a tag from it, here's my
recipe:

1. Checkout Boost from git:
https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/wiki/TryModBoost
2. cd libs/your_library_name
3. git checkout develop
4. git pull
5. git branch -r >../../branches.txt
6. remove from ../../branches.txt  following branches "origin/HEAD ->
origin/master", "origin/develop", "origin/master" and branches that you do
with to save (for example "origin/svn-branches/maintenance/1_55_0")
7. git merge --no-commit list_of_branches_from../../branches.txt
7.1 in case of conflicts revert merge using git merge --abort
7.2 if you are sure that there is nothing good in branches but they  must
be restorable "just in case" do "git merge -s ours --no-commit
list_of_branches_from../../branches.txt"
8. validate that everything is OK using git diff HEAD
9. git commit
10. git push
11. git push origin --delete
list_of_branches_from../../branches.txt_but_with_removed"origin/"

In short:
1. git merge -s ours --no-commit branch_name
2. git push origin --delete branch_name

This will make it look like branches were merged to "develop" branch
without actually making any changes to files. (commits that are reachable
from a tag or a non-deleted branch head won't be lost).

Now if you really need to restore a branch you could find that huge merge
commit in history, find SHA of branch that you wish to restore and do:

git checkout -b branch-name SHA

-- 
Best regards,
Antony Polukhin