# date change of commit? 7 messages from 2009-10-25 to 2009-10-29. Participants: Alex K, Matthieu Moy, Miklos Vajna, Rogan Dawes, Thomas Rast. Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/21348 ## Alex K, 2009-10-25 11:35 Subject: date change of commit? Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/e4a904790910250435p3ff50dcfv5c0c6a86c13d17b%40mail.gmail.com ``` Hello, Is it possible to change the date of a commit? Thank you, Alex ``` ## Matthieu Moy, 2009-10-25 17:14 Subject: Re: date change of commit? Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/vpq1vkrqttt.fsf%40bauges.imag.fr In-Reply-To: ``` Alex K writes: > Hello, > > Is it possible to change the date of a commit? See git-filter-branch. This won't change the date of the existing commit (which is impossible in Git), but will create another commit where only the date has been changed. -- Matthieu Moy http://www-verimag.imag.fr/~moy/ ``` ## Alex K, 2009-10-27 09:41 Subject: Re: date change of commit? Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/e4a904790910270241g4a165023o30438c5d000b5de4%40mail.gmail.com In-Reply-To: ``` Thank you. And how would you use git-filter-branch to create another branch with a different time stamp? Is it possible to commit under a different time stamp than the one provided by your default local time? 2009/10/25 Matthieu Moy : > Alex K writes: > >> Hello, >> >> Is it possible to change the date of a commit? > > See git-filter-branch. This won't change the date of the existing > commit (which is impossible in Git), but will create another commit > where only the date has been changed. > > -- > Matthieu Moy > http://www-verimag.imag.fr/~moy/ > -- > To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in > the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org > More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html > ``` ## Miklos Vajna, 2009-10-27 12:21 Subject: Re: date change of commit? Message-ID: <20091027122156.GD6115@genesis.frugalware.org> URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/20091027122156.GD6115%40genesis.frugalware.org In-Reply-To: ``` On Tue, Oct 27, 2009 at 10:41:47AM +0100, Alex K wrote: > Thank you. And how would you use git-filter-branch to create another > branch with a different time stamp? Is it possible to commit under a > different time stamp than the one provided by your default local time? You can set GIT_AUTHOR_DATE and GIT_COMMITTER_DATE. Both expect a format like: "1112911993 -0700" (unix timestamp + timezone info). ``` ## Alex K, 2009-10-29 12:55 Subject: Re: date change of commit? Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/e4a904790910290555n61bca296g3624c1aced50ed85%40mail.gmail.com In-Reply-To: <20091027122156.GD6115@genesis.frugalware.org> ``` And how do you actually set those variables? Sorry to ask such a trivial question but it's been an hour that i'm going through the doc for such a simple feature. I thought those were environment variables ... but they are not seen under git var -l. Thank you. 2009/10/27 Miklos Vajna : > On Tue, Oct 27, 2009 at 10:41:47AM +0100, Alex K wrote: >> Thank you. And how would you use git-filter-branch to create another >> branch with a different time stamp? Is it possible to commit under a >> different time stamp than the one provided by your default local time? > > You can set GIT_AUTHOR_DATE and GIT_COMMITTER_DATE. Both expect a format > like: "1112911993 -0700" (unix timestamp + timezone info). > ``` ## Rogan Dawes, 2009-10-29 14:47 Subject: Re: date change of commit? Message-ID: <4AE9AAE7.2080404@dawes.za.net> URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/4AE9AAE7.2080404%40dawes.za.net In-Reply-To: ``` Alex K wrote: > And how do you actually set those variables? Sorry to ask such a > trivial question but it's been an hour that i'm going through the doc > for such a simple feature. I thought those were environment variables > ... but they are not seen under git var -l. Thank you. > As you suspected, they are environment variables. i.e. : $ GIT_AUTHOR_DATE="1112911993 -0700" git commit x Hope that helps. Rogan > 2009/10/27 Miklos Vajna : >> On Tue, Oct 27, 2009 at 10:41:47AM +0100, Alex K wrote: >>> Thank you. And how would you use git-filter-branch to create another >>> branch with a different time stamp? Is it possible to commit under a >>> different time stamp than the one provided by your default local time? >> You can set GIT_AUTHOR_DATE and GIT_COMMITTER_DATE. Both expect a format >> like: "1112911993 -0700" (unix timestamp + timezone info). >> ``` ## Thomas Rast, 2009-10-29 16:43 Subject: Re: date change of commit? Message-ID: <200910291743.53701.trast@student.ethz.ch> URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/200910291743.53701.trast%40student.ethz.ch In-Reply-To: <4AE9AAE7.2080404@dawes.za.net> ``` Rogan Dawes wrote: > Alex K wrote: > > And how do you actually set those variables? Sorry to ask such a > > trivial question but it's been an hour that i'm going through the doc > > for such a simple feature. I thought those were environment variables > > As you suspected, they are environment variables. > > i.e. : > > $ GIT_AUTHOR_DATE="1112911993 -0700" git commit x Since this was in the context of git-filter-branch, I should point out that you'll have to use the variables with --env-filter and (like the manpage says) make sure you export them. So to change the date of a single commit with SHA1 , you could say git filter-branch --env-filter ' if [ $GIT_COMMIT = ]; then export GIT_AUTHOR_DATE="1112911993 -0700" export GIT_COMMITTER_DATE="1112911993 -0700" fi ' Alex K wrote: > for such a simple feature I'm not sure if you're referring to setting the variables or actually rewriting the commits here, but anyway: The reason why the latter is so hard is that rewriting "old" history is a _huge_ hassle for people who already have the previous version of that history. That being said, _why_? The dates are never a guarantee that something happened earlier or later precisely because they can easily be modified at commit time. So nobody should take them as more than a hint, and there's little use in faking hints. -- Thomas Rast trast@{inf,student}.ethz.ch ```