Git amend Command: A Comprehensive Guide

In Git, the amend command is a powerful feature that allows you to modify your last commit. This is useful if you forgot to add a file or made a typo in your commit message. In this article, we will take a deep dive into how to use amend command in Git.

Before We Start

Before starting, it is important to mention that amending a commit rewrites Git history. If you have already pushed the original commit to a remote branch, amending it can cause problems for team members who have pulled the changes. Therefore, it is recommended that you only amend commits that have not been pushed to the remote branch.

How to Amend Your Last Commit

To amend your last commit, simply make the changes you want to the files in your project and then stage those changes as you would for a normal commit using git add. Once the changes are staged, run the following command:

git commit --amend

This will open your default text editor with the commit message of your last commit. You can modify the message or keep it as it is. Save the file and exit the editor to complete the amend operation.

Amend with No Changes

If you realize that you have no changes to commit after you have made changes to the commit message or have staged some changes already, you can use the --no-edit option to amend your commit without changing the commit message. Run this command:

git commit --amend --no-edit

Amend Files Only

If you have made changes in your files but want to use the same commit message as your last commit, you can use --no-edit option to amend your commit without changing the commit message. Run this command:

git commit --amend --no-edit

Fix the Author Information

Sometimes, you may want to amend the author information of your last commit. To do this, use the --reset-author option with the amend command like this:

git commit --amend --reset-author

This will change the author information to your current Git configuration.

Amend an Older Commit

Sometimes you may need to amend a commit that is not your last one. In this case, you can use the interactive rebase command to change the commit.

First, identify the commit you want to amend using git log. Then run the following command:

git rebase -i [SHA-1 of the commit to be changed]~1

This will open a text editor with the commits that are going to be rebased. Find the commit you wish to amend and replace the command word (usually pick) with edit. This will tell Git to stop at that commit so that you can amend it.

Now run the following command:

git commit --amend

Make the necessary changes and then run:

git rebase --continue

This will apply the amended commit on top of the original ones. If you have multiple commits to amend, repeat the above steps for each commit.

Conclusion

In this article, we have explored the amend command in Git in detail. We have seen how to amend your last commit, amend files only, fix author information and how to amend an older commit using interactive rebase. While amending commits is a powerful tool, it should only be done with caution and never on commits that have already been pushed to a remote branch.