# How to rebase and rename?

2 messages from 2010-02-03 to 2010-02-03. Participants: Peter Krefting, Jeff King.
Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/22503

## Peter Krefting, 2010-02-03 09:05

Subject: How to rebase and rename?
Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.2.00.1002030958380.17444@ds9.cixit.se>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/alpine.DEB.2.00.1002030958380.17444%40ds9.cixit.se

```
Hi!

If I have a repository with a topic branch that is published, and that I 
want to rebase and republish under a new name, is there an easy way of doing 
that?

I.e., I want to go from

      ---C---D topic-1
     /
  --A---X---X---B master

to

        ---C---D topic-1
 	  /
      /           ---C'---D' topic-2
     /           /
  --A---X---X---B master

Currently, I do something along the lines of:

  git branch topic-2 topic-1
  git rebase master topic-2

but that feels wrong as it creates the "topic-2" branch pointing the 
the wrong way first. Is there a way to eliminate that step?

-- 
\\// Peter - http://www.softwolves.pp.se/

```

## Jeff King, 2010-02-03 09:48

Subject: Re: How to rebase and rename?
Message-ID: <20100203094806.GB23956@coredump.intra.peff.net>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/20100203094806.GB23956%40coredump.intra.peff.net
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.00.1002030958380.17444@ds9.cixit.se>

```
On Wed, Feb 03, 2010 at 10:05:10AM +0100, Peter Krefting wrote:

> If I have a repository with a topic branch that is published, and
> that I want to rebase and republish under a new name, is there an
> easy way of doing that?
> [...]
> Currently, I do something along the lines of:
> 
>  git branch topic-2 topic-1
>  git rebase master topic-2
> 
> but that feels wrong as it creates the "topic-2" branch pointing the
> the wrong way first. Is there a way to eliminate that step?

No, I think that is the best way to do it. Since the creation of topic-2
is happening in your (presumably) private repo, it is not a big deal for
it to exist in an unintertesting state for a few seconds.

If you really cared, you could do the work on a detached HEAD and then
assign the result to a new branch, but that is even more typing:

  git checkout topic-1^0
  git rebase master
  git checkout -b topic-2

It also causes git to do slightly more work. In your example, the branch
creation is O(1), then rebase resets back to master and applies each
commit in topic-1 in turn. In mine, we actually reset the checkout to
topic-1, then reset it to master, and then apply the commits. Not that
it probably matters unless you have some enormous repository.

-Peff

```