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Git
Git Rebase

Git Rebase Guide

Rebasing is one of the most powerful—and most misunderstood—commands in Git. It is the art of Rewriting History.

1. What is a Rebase?

Rebasing is the process of moving or combining a sequence of commits to a new base commit. In simpler terms, it takes your feature branch and "re-plants" it at the very tip of the target branch (usually main).

2. Standard Rebase Workflow

When your feature branch has fallen behind main, follow these steps to catch up:

  1. Update Local Main: git switch main -> git pull
  2. Start Rebase: git switch my-feature -> git rebase main
  3. Handle Conflicts (If they occur):
    • Edit the files to fix conflicts.
    • git add <file>
    • git rebase --continue (Don't commit!)
  4. Final Result: Your feature is now on top of the latest project code.

3. Interactive Rebase (-i)

The most common professional use of rebase is to clean up messy local history before opening a Pull Request.

# Clean up the last 3 commits
git rebase -i HEAD~3

Git will open a text editor with a list of your commits and available commands:

CommandActionBest For...
pickUse the commit as-is.Default.
rewordUse the commit but edit the message.Fixing typos in messages.
squashCombine this commit into the previous one.Merging small "fix-it" commits.
fixupLike squash, but discards the message.Silently combining minor tweaks.
dropRemove the commit entirely.Deleting accidental or buggy work.

4. Rebase vs. Merge

FeatureMergingRebasing
PhilosophyPreserve History. Shows exactly when work was combined.Cleaner History. Linear log as if work happened in a straight line.
Commit LogMessy (many merge commits).Professional and readable.
Risk LevelLow.High (rewrites history).

[!CAUTION] The Golden Rule of Rebasing Never rebase a branch that has been pushed to a shared repository. Rebasing rewrites history by creating new commit IDs. If your teammates have already pulled the "old" version, rebasing will break their history. Only rebase your private, local branches.

Branching StrategiesGit Stash