# Remove all files except a few files, using filter-branch 5 messages from 2012-09-16 to 2012-09-18. Participants: Yi, EungJun, Andreas Schwab, Johannes Sixt. Thread: https://gitlist.dev/t/31558 ## Yi, EungJun, 2012-09-16 16:28 Subject: Remove all files except a few files, using filter-branch Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/CAFT%2BTg_ipyPgNQxx8XsXySzmA3YM3mKe1gB5GyTNqN%2B%2BgdphnQ%40mail.gmail.com ``` Hi, all. I want to remove all files except a few files, in the history of my git repository. I tried to do that as follows: git filter-branch --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch $(git ls-files | grep -v '^filename$' | tr '\n' ' ')" But this does not work well if there is a file whose name is not encoded in us-ascii or includes parenthesis. git-filter-branch is great to remove some files in my repository, but not good enough to remove all except only a few. Does anyone know the better way? ``` ## Andreas Schwab, 2012-09-16 17:06 Subject: Re: Remove all files except a few files, using filter-branch Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/m24nmxkibw.fsf%40igel.home In-Reply-To: ``` "Yi, EungJun" writes: > Hi, all. > > I want to remove all files except a few files, in the history of my > git repository. > > I tried to do that as follows: > > git filter-branch --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch > $(git ls-files | grep -v '^filename$' | tr '\n' ' ')" Try instead first removing all files, then restoring the files you want to keep. --index-filter "git rm --cached -qr -- . && git reset -q -- filename" Andreas. -- Andreas Schwab, schwab@linux-m68k.org GPG Key fingerprint = 58CA 54C7 6D53 942B 1756 01D3 44D5 214B 8276 4ED5 "And now for something completely different." ``` ## Yi, EungJun, 2012-09-18 15:01 Subject: Re: Remove all files except a few files, using filter-branch Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/CAFT%2BTg-4q0mzD6rdY74WBP-0OM_SaZ_wkCAn%2BGz2_eDte2a4Nw%40mail.gmail.com In-Reply-To: ``` > --index-filter "git rm --cached -qr -- . && git reset -q -- filename" Hmm... I tried as you said, but it seems to lose history. In the below example, after rewriting there must be two commits for 'b' file but only one exists. ~$ git init filter-branch2 Initialized empty Git repository in /home/nori/mysrc/test/git/filter-branch2/.git/ ~/filter-branch2$ cd filter-branch2 ~/filter-branch2$ echo 1 > a ~/filter-branch2$ echo 1 > b ~/filter-branch2$ git add a b ~/filter-branch2$ git commit -m 'first' [master (root-commit) ae2b5fd] first 2 files changed, 2 insertions(+) create mode 100644 a create mode 100644 b ~/filter-branch2$ echo 2 >> b ~/filter-branch2$ git add b ~/filter-branch2$ git commit -m 'second' [master a32b84e] second 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+) ~/filter-branch2$ git filter-branch --index-filter "git rm --cached -qr -- . && git reset -q -- b" Rewrite a32b84ed7cec5686e43a47195dfa8114f83619f3 (2/2) Ref 'refs/heads/master' was rewritten ~/filter-branch2$ git log -- b commit 19611f9eaf412232e237afcc059d0324a862062f Author: Yi EungJun Date: Tue Sep 18 23:51:53 2012 +0900 first Am I doing something wrong? On Mon, Sep 17, 2012 at 2:06 AM, Andreas Schwab wrote: > "Yi, EungJun" writes: > >> Hi, all. >> >> I want to remove all files except a few files, in the history of my >> git repository. >> >> I tried to do that as follows: >> >> git filter-branch --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch >> $(git ls-files | grep -v '^filename$' | tr '\n' ' ')" > > Try instead first removing all files, then restoring the files you want > to keep. > > --index-filter "git rm --cached -qr -- . && git reset -q -- filename" > > Andreas. > > -- > Andreas Schwab, schwab@linux-m68k.org > GPG Key fingerprint = 58CA 54C7 6D53 942B 1756 01D3 44D5 214B 8276 4ED5 > "And now for something completely different." ``` ## Johannes Sixt, 2012-09-18 15:10 Subject: Re: Remove all files except a few files, using filter-branch Message-ID: <50588ED7.4090501@viscovery.net> URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/50588ED7.4090501%40viscovery.net In-Reply-To: ``` Am 9/18/2012 17:01, schrieb Yi, EungJun: >> --index-filter "git rm --cached -qr -- . && git reset -q -- filename" > > Hmm... I tried as you said, but it seems to lose history. I think it should be '... && git reset -q $GIT_COMMIT -- filename' -- Hannes ``` ## Yi, EungJun, 2012-09-18 15:25 Subject: Re: Remove all files except a few files, using filter-branch Message-ID: URL: https://gitlist.dev/e/CAFT%2BTg_UbG8C9o2E5P1E2a9GXgLhn2fmE8sMA4un0Kai2HrOeg%40mail.gmail.com In-Reply-To: <50588ED7.4090501@viscovery.net> ``` > I think it should be '... && git reset -q $GIT_COMMIT -- filename' It works! Thanks to Hannes and Andreas! On Wed, Sep 19, 2012 at 12:10 AM, Johannes Sixt wrote: > Am 9/18/2012 17:01, schrieb Yi, EungJun: >>> --index-filter "git rm --cached -qr -- . && git reset -q -- filename" >> >> Hmm... I tried as you said, but it seems to lose history. > > I think it should be '... && git reset -q $GIT_COMMIT -- filename' > > -- Hannes ```