I found the below script that lists the branches by date. How do I filter this to exclude newer branches and feed the results into the Git delete command?
for k in $(git branch | sed /\*/d); do
echo "$(git log -1 --pretty=format:"%ct" $k) $k"
done | sort -r | awk '{print $2}'
How about using --since and --before?
For example, this will delete all branches that have not received any commits for a week:
for k in $(git branch | sed /\*/d); do
if [ -z "$(git log -1 --since='1 week ago' -s $k)" ]; then
git branch -D $k
fi
done
If you want to delete all branches that are more than a week old, use --before:
for k in $(git branch | sed /\*/d); do
if [ -z "$(git log -1 --before='1 week ago' -s $k)" ]; then
git branch -D $k
fi
done
Be warned though that this will also delete branches that where not merged into master or whatever the checked out branch is.
The poor man's method:
List the branches by the date of last commit:
git branch --sort=committerdate | xargs echo
this will list the branches while xargs echo pipe makes it inline (thx Jesse).
You will see all your branches with old ones at the beginning:
1_branch 2_branch 3_branch 4_branch
Copy the first n ones, which are outdated and paste at the end of the batch delete command:
git branch -D 1_branch 2_branch
This will delete the selected ones only, so you have more control over the process.
To list the branches by creation date, use the --sort=authordate:iso8601 command as suggested by Amy
Use
git branch -r --sort=committerdate | xargs echo (says
kustomrtr) to review the remote branches, than git push origin -d 1_branch 2_branch to delete the merged ones
(thx Jonas).
Safe way to show the delete commands only for local branches merged into master with the last commit over a month ago.
for k in $(git branch --format="%(refname:short)" --merged master); do
if (($(git log -1 --since='1 month ago' -s $k|wc -l)==0)); then
echo git branch -d $k
fi
done
This does nothing but to output something like:
git branch -d issue_3212
git branch -d fix_ui_search
git branch -d issue_3211
Which I copy and paste directly (remove the echo to delete it directly)
This is very safe.
Delete 5 oldest remote branches
git branch -r --sort=committerdate | head -n 5 | sed 's/ origin\///' | xargs git push origin --delete
This is what worked for me:
for k in $(git branch -r | sed /\*/d); do
if [ -z "$(git log -1 --since='Aug 10, 2016' -s $k)" ]; then
branch_name_with_no_origin=$(echo $k | sed -e "s/origin\///")
echo deleting branch: $branch_name_with_no_origin
git push origin --delete $branch_name_with_no_origin
fi
done
The crucial part is that the branch name (variable $k) contains the /origin/ part eg origin/feature/my-cool-new-branch
However, if you try to git push --delete, it'll fail with an error like:
unable to delete 'origin/feature/my-cool-new-branch': remote ref does not exist.
So we use sed to remove the /origin/ part so that we are left with a branch name like feature/my-cool-new-branch and now git push --delete will work.
It's something similar to Daniel Baulig answer, but also takes in consideration ben's comment. Also It filters branches by a given patter, since we're using try-XX convention for branching.
for k in $(git branch -r | awk -F/ '/\/YOUR_PREFIX_HERE/{print $2}' | sed /\*/d); do
if [ -z "$(git log -1 --since='Jul 31, 2015' -s origin/$k)" ]; then
echo deleting "$(git log -1 --pretty=format:"%ct" origin/$k) origin/$k";
git push origin --delete $k;
fi;
done
Actually, I found the accepted answer wasn't reliable enough for me because of the ben's comment. I was looking for cleaning up old release branches so it's possible that the top commit has been cherry picked and has an old commit date... Here's my take on it:
REMOTE_NAME=origin
EXPIRY_DATE=$(date +"%Y-%m-%d" -d "-4 week")
git fetch $REMOTE_NAME --prune
git for-each-ref --format='%(committerdate:short) %(refname:lstrip=3) %(refname:short)' --sort -committerdate refs/remotes/$REMOTE_NAME | while read date branch remote_branch; do
# protected branch
if [[ $branch =~ ^master$|^HEAD$ ]]; then
printf "%9s | %s | %50s | %s\n" "PROTECTED" $date $branch $remote_branch
elif [[ "$date" < "$EXPIRY_DATE" ]]; then
printf "%9s | %s | %50s | %s\n" "DELETE" $date $branch $remote_branch
#git push $REMOTE_NAME --delete $branch
fi
done
You can easily adapt the delete command based on your needs. Use this carefully.
Output example:
The above code did not work for me, but it was close. Instead, I used the following:
for k in $(git branch | sed /\*/d); do
if [[ ! $(git log -1 --since='2 weeks ago' -s $k) ]]; then
git branch -D $k
fi
done
for k in $(git branch -r | sed /\*/d); do
if [ -n "$(git log -1 --before='80 week ago' -s $k)" ]; then
git push origin --delete "${k/origin\//}"
fi
done
I'm assuming that you want to delete just the refs, not the commits in the branches. To delete all merged branches except the most recent __X__:
git branch -d `for k in $(git branch | sed /\*/d); do
echo "$(git log -1 --pretty=format:"%ct" $k) $k"
done | sort -r | awk 'BEGIN{ORS=" "}; {if(NR>__X__) print $2}'`
To delete all branches before timestamp __Y__:
git branch -d `for k in $(git branch | sed /\*/d); do
echo "$(git log -1 --pretty=format:"%ct" $k) $k"
done | sort -r | awk 'BEGIN{ORS=" "}; {if($1<__Y__) print $2}'`
Replace the -d option by -D if you want to delete branches that haven't been merged as well... but be careful, because that will cause the dangling commits to be garbage-collected at some point.
Based on @daniel-baulig's answer and the comments I came up with this:
for k in $(git branch -r --format="%(refname:short)" | sed s#^origin/##); do
if [ -z "$(git log -1 --since='4 week ago' -s $k)" ]; then
## Info about the branches before deleting
git log -1 --format="%ci %ce - %H $k" -s $k;
## Delete from the remote
git push origin --delete $k;
## Delete the local branch, regardless of whether it's been merged or not
git branch -D $k
fi;
done
This can be used to delete all old branches (merged or NOT). The motivation for doing so is that it is unlikely that branches that has not been touched in a month rot and never make it to master. Naturally, the timeframe for pruning old branches depends on how fast the master branch moves.
Sometimes it needs to know if a branch has been merged to the master branch. For that purpose could be used the following script:
#!/usr/bin/env bash
read -p "If you want delete branhes type 'D', otherwise press 'Enter' and branches will be printed out only: " action
[[ $action = "D" ]] && ECHO="" || ECHO="echo"
for b in $(git branch -r --merged origin/master | sed /\*/d | egrep -v "^\*|master|develop"); do
if [ "$(git log $b --since "10 months ago" | wc -l)" -eq 0 ]; then
$ECHO git push origin --delete "${b/origin\/}" --no-verify;
fi
done
Tested on Ubuntu 18.04
For how using PowerShell:
git branch -r --merged | Select-String -NotMatch "(^\*|master)" | %{ $_ -replace ".*/", "" } | %{ git push origin --delete $_ }
git branch -r --merged | Select-String -NotMatch "(^\*|master)" | %{ $_ -replace ".*/", "" } | Set-Content -Path .\deleted-branches.txt
The branches can be found with this one liner:
git for-each-ref --sort=committerdate refs/heads --format='%(refname:short) %(committerdate:unix)' | awk '{if ($2 + 7 * 24 * 3600 < systime() ) print $1}'
This is an automated bash script to delete git branches older than a specific period. The default set time is 3 months, but you can pass the period in months as a first parameter while running the shell script.
#!/bin/sh
:'
This is an automated bash script to delete git branches older than some specific time period.
The default set time is 3 months, but you can pass the period in months as a first parameter while running the shell script
'
declare -i numberOfMonths=3 # Declare the default period in months
declare blackListedBranches # Blacklisted branches
clear=clear # Command to clear terminal
ECHO='echo ' # Custom echo
${clear} # Clear terminal
# Check for passed period(In months) parameter
if [ -z "$1" ];
then
# Period not set
echo ""
echo "Period not set. Assuming delete period to the default $numberOfMonths months period!"
echo ""
sleep 2 # Hold for 2 seconds
else
# Period set
numberOfMonths=$1 # Set passed period
fi
echo "Deleting branches older than $numberOfMonths months!"
echo ""
sleep 1 # Hold for a second
# Set branches to exclude in deletion
blackListedBranches="main,master,development"
# Check for trailing commas to remove them
if [[ "$blackListedBranches" == *, ]];
then
declare trimmedValue=$(sed 's/.\{1\}$//' <<< "$blackListedBranches") # Remove last character
blackListedBranches="$trimmedValue" # Re-assign value
fi
# Start loop to search for commas
while true; do
# Check for commas in case of comma separated list to create a list for GREP
case "$blackListedBranches" in
*,*)
declare branchSeparator="$\|" # Declare separator syntax
blackListedBranches=${blackListedBranches/,/$branchSeparator} # Replace comma with GREP separator syntax
;;
*) # Default
break # Break loop
;;
esac
done
blackListedBranches="${blackListedBranches}$" # Append dollar sign at the end of GREP list
echo "The branches [ $blackListedBranches ] will not be deleted!"
sleep 2 # Hold for 2 seconds
echo "The branches below will be deleted!"
sleep 1 # Hold for 2 seconds
git branch -a | sed 's/^\s*//' | sed 's/^remotes\///' | grep -v $blackListedBranches
sleep 4 # Hold for 2 seconds
: '
Initiate loop scanning for branches older than passed time or set default while excluding the below branches
main, master
'
for target_branch in $(git branch -a | sed 's/^\s*//' | sed 's/^remotes\///' | grep -v $blackListedBranches);
do
# Check period
if ! ( [[ -f "$target_branch" ]] || [[ -d "$target_branch" ]] ) && [[ "$(git log $target_branch --since "$numberOfMonths month ago" | wc -l)" -eq 0 ]]; then
if [[ "$DRY_RUN" = "false" ]];
then
ECHO="" # Empty echo
fi
local_target_branch_name=$(echo "$target_branch" | sed 's/remotes\/origin\///') # Get target branch in iteration
local_target_branch_name=${local_target_branch_name/origin\//} # Replace string "origin/" with empty(string)
$ECHO Deleting Local Branch : "${local_target_branch_name}" # Print message
sleep 1 # Hold for a second
git branch -d "${local_target_branch_name}" # Delete local branch
$ECHO Deleting Remote Branch : "${local_target_branch_name}" # Print message
sleep 1 # Hold for a second
git push origin --delete "${local_target_branch_name}" # Delete remote branch
fi
done
My solution:
~/.zshrc....
# delete local branches that have not been updated within the last 3 months.
deleteStaleBranches() {
# Step 1: Get the list of branches and their last commit dates
TZ='Asia/Shanghai' git for-each-ref --sort=-committerdate --format='%(refname:short) %(committerdate:format-local:%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S)' refs/heads | while read branch date; do
# Skip branches with specific names
if [[ $branch =~ ^(main|master|dev|develop|code-review)$ ]]; then
continue
fi
# Step 2: Identify branches not updated within the last 3 months and delete them
cutoff_date=$(TZ='Asia/Shanghai' date -v-3m +%Y-%m-%d)
if [[ $date < $cutoff_date ]]; then
echo "Branch '$branch' last updated on $date (older than 3 months)."
# Uncomment the next line to delete the branch
git branch -D "$branch"
fi
done
}
# Delete remote branches that have not been updated within the last 3 months.
deleteStaleRemoteBranches() {
# Step 1: Get the list of remote branches and their last commit dates
git ls-remote --heads origin | while read sha ref; do
# Extract the branch name from the full ref name
branch=$(basename "$ref")
# Skip branches with specific names
if [[ $branch =~ ^(main|master|dev|develop|code-review)$ ]]; then
continue
fi
# Step 2: Get the last commit date for the remote branch
date=$(TZ='Asia/Shanghai' git show --format="%ci" "$sha" | head -n 1)
# Step 3: Identify branches not updated within the last 3 months and delete them
cutoff_date=$(TZ='Asia/Shanghai' date -v -3m "+%Y-%m-%d" 2>/dev/null || python -c "from datetime import datetime, timedelta; print((datetime.now() - timedelta(days=90)).strftime('%Y-%m-%d'))")
if [[ "$date" < "$cutoff_date" ]]; then
echo "Remote branch '$branch' last updated on $date (older than 3 months)."
# Uncomment the next line to delete the remote branch
git push origin --delete "$branch"
fi
done
}
...
source ~/.zshrc.$ deleteStaleBranches or $ deleteStaleBranches in your repository.