git cherry-pick to another branch

Question

I wonder if there is the way to copy one commit to another branch without checking out that branch.

For example, I have two branches: master and parallel_version.

I'm on parallel_version branch and I found a bug in file common for these branches.

I've fixed it and committed. How to duplicate this commit to another branch, assuming I'm using git-svn?

Normally I would do:

$ git checkout master
$ git cherry-pick parallel_version
$ git checkout parallel_version

Is there better way of doing that?

score 10 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 14 '12 at 12:43

10

That's not possible - simply imagine what would happen if there was a conflict that couldn't be resolved automatically. For the same reason you also can't update branches that are not currently checked-out (even if a fast-forward was possible).

answered Dec 14 '12 at 12:43

ThiefMaster

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You can update other branch with: git fetch origin & git branch mybranch origin/mybranch -f – mnaoumov Dec 09 '13 at 23:55
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@mnaoumov Even simpler: `git fetch :` – Nicu Stiurca Mar 16 '19 at 05:33
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"Not possible in the current implementation", yes. "Not worth the trouble to implement it properly" - maybe. But a potentially unresolvable conflict is not a good argument for that: in that case the cherry-pick should fail without making changes to working dir or repo state. – peterchen Feb 09 '21 at 09:17
"For the same reason you also can't update branches that are not currently checked-out (even if a fast-forward was possible)." This sentence is false: https://stackoverflow.com/a/17722977/86845 – João Portela Dec 14 '21 at 16:31

score 6 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 16 '15 at 04:33

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https://github.com/lennartcl/gitl provides "git cherry-copy" and "git cherry-move" scripts that do this and handle most of the corner cases.

answered Sep 16 '15 at 04:33

lennartcl

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Looks like "git cherry-copy" just automates the 3 manual steps outlined by the OP. Thus, it does not contradict @ThiefMaster. I was hoping to cherry-copy a commit to branch "later" **while** compiling the current branch. That didn't go well… – user2394284 Jun 14 '17 at 07:33

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 07 '18 at 13:47

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Crazy idea (based on mnaoumov's comment) if you really want to avoid touching the checked out files (say you don't want to disturb your build system) … that's what I want anyway.

Clone the whole git repo to a temporary directory.
Do the work in the clone.
Add the clone as a remote.
git fetch clone && git branch mybranch clone/mybranch -f
Clean up.

This would be a thing to automate. If you have filesystem snapshots, cloning the whole repo is cheap – perhaps not so crazy after all…

answered Mar 07 '18 at 13:47

user2394284

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In that case it is better to use `git worktree` instead of clone. It won't copy whole `.git` – kassak May 22 '18 at 06:32
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That's actually a good hack. The inefficiency shouldn't matter for small-ish projects. – leftaroundabout Oct 16 '18 at 08:45
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Instead of adding the tmp clone as a remote, you could just push _from_ the clone to its origin – FFD-pushing to a not-checked-out branch on a remote is after all no problem. – leftaroundabout Oct 16 '18 at 08:50

leftaroundabout · Answer 4 · 2019-07-05T12:31:12.267

Here's a small script that creates a temporary clone of the repository, as suggested by user2394284:

_{/usr/bin/git-tmp-clone or ~/bin/git-tmp-clone}

#!/bin/bash

gitTopLevel=$(git rev-parse --show-toplevel)

# Unique name for the temporary clone.
totalhash=$(tar -c "$gitTopLevel/.git" 2> /dev/null | sha256sum | head -c8)

tmprepo="/tmp/$(basename $(pwd))_${totalhash}"

git clone "$gitTopLevel" ${tmprepo}

# Start an interactive shell in the clone. Pass any
# arguments as initial commands to be executed.
/bin/bash --init-file <(echo "cd ${tmprepo}; $@")

# Clean up the clone.
rm -rf ${tmprepo} && echo "Deleted ${tmprepo}"

(This script is less than robust, but it seems to work for me on Ubuntu.)

You can use this to cherry-pick e.g. the last commit on the current brach to another branch, by running

git-tmp-clone "git checkout TARGET_BRANCH
            && git cherry-pick $(git rev-parse --short @)
            && git push origin HEAD"

(Note that in this example, the rev-parse is evaluated in the origin repository before the clone is created! That's why it points to the most recent commit. Adapt as needed.)

git cherry-pick to another branch

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