# merge only some of the changed files?

3 messages from 2010-03-19 to 2010-03-19. Participants: fkater@googlemail.com, Michael J Gruber, Thomas Rast.
Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/23080

## fkater@googlemail.com, 2010-03-19 13:40

Subject: merge only some of the changed files?
Message-ID: <20100319134028.GA2318@comppasch2>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/20100319134028.GA2318%40comppasch2

```
Hi all,

I am quite new to git.

If I want to merge branch B into A, however not all of the
changed files in B, how do I do that?

In other words: 'git diff --name-only A..B' lists 10 files
but I want to merge only 5 of them.

Thank You
 Felix

```

## Michael J Gruber, 2010-03-19 13:55

Subject: Re: merge only some of the changed files?
Message-ID: <4BA3825E.1070700@drmicha.warpmail.net>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/4BA3825E.1070700%40drmicha.warpmail.net
In-Reply-To: <20100319134028.GA2318@comppasch2>

```
fkater@googlemail.com venit, vidit, dixit 19.03.2010 14:40:
> Hi all,
> 
> I am quite new to git.
> 
> If I want to merge branch B into A, however not all of the
> changed files in B, how do I do that?
> 
> In other words: 'git diff --name-only A..B' lists 10 files
> but I want to merge only 5 of them.

If you are sure you don't want to merge the changes to them later on,
you can do the following while on branch A

# perform the merge but do not commit
git merge --no-commit B
# overwrite the files you want to keep with their version from A
git checkout HEAD -- file1 file2
# commit the merge result
git commit

Cheers,
Michael

```

## Thomas Rast, 2010-03-19 14:01

Subject: Re: merge only some of the changed files?
Message-ID: <201003191501.58045.trast@student.ethz.ch>
URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/201003191501.58045.trast%40student.ethz.ch
In-Reply-To: <20100319134028.GA2318@comppasch2>

```
fkater@googlemail.com wrote:
> If I want to merge branch B into A, however not all of the
> changed files in B, how do I do that?
> 
> In other words: 'git diff --name-only A..B' lists 10 files
> but I want to merge only 5 of them.

First of all, these are not the differences that would be merged: if
you're on A and run 'git merge B', it will merge the changes since the
merge-base(s) of A and B.  Assuming you only have a single merge-base,
this is

  git diff $(git merge-base A B) B

which you can write more conveniently (see man git-diff) as

  git diff A...B

(note the three dots!).

Second, you can't really do a "half merge" because that would be a
lie.  A merge promises to bring all changes from all parents, which
you don't want to do.  You can either split out the relevant changes
from your branch (use e.g. git-cherry-pick or 'git rebase -i' on a new
branch B1 started from B) on the branch, and merge that.  Or you can
do a "squashed merge" of only the files you want by saying e.g.

  git diff A...B -- file1 file2 | git apply

and then committing that with a suitable message.

-- 
Thomas Rast
trast@{inf,student}.ethz.ch

```