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This article provides guidance for squashing all completed commits into a single commit.

Suppose we have made a bunch of commits on a topic branch, and now we need to clean it up by grouping all the commits on this branch into one commit. Git calls this squashing.

The idea behind squashing all commits is as follows.

1. Use a soft reset to reset all changes.
2. Re-add the changes.
3. Submit a new message.

Git soft reset changes

A soft reset will undo all commits without removing newly added files.

To do this, we have to find the original commit where the feature branch was, usually the name of the original branch, maine.g.

$ git log
commit a856ee456967a942ab379b27a4839962f88b92ce (HEAD -> feature/long-features)
Author: Cuong Nguyen
Date:   Mon Dec 27 20:53:18 2021 +0700

    Feature 2.3

commit 6f1599a18691906ed148dc40d2d290aaeceeaa5c
Author: Cuong Nguyen
Date:   Mon Dec 27 20:53:03 2021 +0700

    Subfeature 2

commit 94e35bae85f395c62fdaaa1aeaedbb11d2c94375
Author: Cuong Nguyen
Date:   Mon Dec 27 20:52:39 2021 +0700

    Subfeature 1

commit 9265e3bd97863fde0a13084f04163ceceff9a9d0 (grafted, tag: v1.0.0, branch-off-from-tag-v1.0.0)
Author: Cuong Nguyen
Date:   Sun Dec 19 19:33:07 2021 +0700

    Merge pull request #1 from stwarts/feature/shared-branch

In this example, we found the branch that was checked out feature/long-featuresfrom the commit SHA 9265e3bd97863fde0a13084f04163ceceff9a9d0(or from the branch name ) .branch-off-from-tag-v1.0.0

To reset all modifications, use git reset --soft 9265e3bd97863fde0a13084f04163ceceff9a9d0or git reset --soft branch-off-from-tag-v1.0.0.

$ git reset --soft 9265e3bd97863fde0a13084f04163ceceff9a9d0
$ git status
On branch feature/long-features
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git restore --staged <file>..." to unstage)
	new file:   sub_feature_1.txt
	new file:   sub_feature_2.txt

--softThe -p option instructs git to reset the commit and keep the new files.

Add back changes

git add -Ais the command to use.

-Aoption specifies that all changes will be added.

submit

The final step is git commit -m <message>to generate a new commit using .

$ git commit -m 'Squash 3 commits into 1'
[feature/long-features 8cc336c] Squash 3 commits into 1
 2 files changed, 2 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 sub_feature_1.txt
 create mode 100644 sub_feature_2.txt
$ git log
commit 8cc336c6d1b2e6ed55470f99b040d6835ec655e5 (HEAD -> feature/long-features)
Author: Cuong Nguyen <cuong.nguyen@oivan.com>
Date:   Mon Dec 27 21:07:54 2021 +0700

    Squash 3 commits into 1

commit 9265e3bd97863fde0a13084f04163ceceff9a9d0 (grafted, tag: v1.0.0, branch-off-from-tag-v1.0.0)
Author: Nguyễn Phú Cường <npcuong.011308@gmail.com>
Date:   Sun Dec 19 19:33:07 2021 +0700

    Merge pull request #1 from stwarts/feature/shared-branch