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On my staging branch, I committed a folder migrations_lar with 1 migration file in it. I found the commit where I added it on November 29th. When I look at the staging branch now, the entire migrations_lar folder is gone. I need to find out when it disappeared. I also want to know if anything else disappeared.

Here is what I have learned:

I ran git log -- database/migrations_lar git log -- database/migrations_lar

The commit where I added the folder has the message "Implement Partner Webhook". None of those other commits delete the folder.

When I get on GitHub and check the status of the staging branch after various commits, I see that folder appears and disappears regularly: enter image description here The highlighted rows DO NOT have my commit, and do not have the migrations_lar folder. The bottom commit has the migrations_lar folder when it was initially created long ago, without my file in it.

I am just completely stumped as to how or when this got lost, and what got lost with it. Any help?

Update

Months ago I added the migrations_lar folder with Laravel's default migrations in it. At some point someone deleted the files therefore the folder.

On Nov 29th I added the folder and the new migration.

At some point after that (I assume) someone created a bad merge with the original deletion. I don't know how this happened. Any clue on how I could find the commit that shows when that file was deleted?!

ajon
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    You’re probably aware, but to make it explicitly clear: nothing got lost. One of the commits deletes the file. Git doesn’t keep track of folders, so if you delete a file in a folder, the folder will also be deleted. Merges mean that the file isn’t necessarily disappearing and reappearing in history. A bad merge commit could also have deleted it. Try a `git log --stat`. – Ry- Dec 22 '17 at 04:20
  • @Ryan Thanks for your help. I am aware that git doesn't manage folders, and that there *HAS* to be a commit where it was deleted. I just can't find one. There are over a hundred commits and I've gone through many of them. I also suspect it was a bad merge commit, but it would show in the change for that commit right? Read my update for the likely cause of the bad merge. – ajon Dec 22 '17 at 04:27
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    Tried a bisect? – Ry- Dec 22 '17 at 04:31

2 Answers2

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Thank you @Ryan. I tried git bisect to find the commit that caused the issue. And I think it helped. I think it identified the commit, but I ignored it.

Then I called git checkout HEAD^; ls database/migrations_lar until I found the commit that had the folder. I found the commit string of the the faulting commit and ran git show https://github.com/completesolar/HelioTrack/commit/226d0b8f940a7bec524360a0f631d87f46dfaab8.

Sure enough I saw

...017_11_28_100558_create_organizations_table.php |  54 ---

Then i realized this commit was when I merged a Pull Request. I reviewed that Pull request and sure enough I had missed that full on code review. From that pull request I revied the 30 commits on the Pull Request and found the offending failed merge.

ajon
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Another approach, beside bisect, is to git log, focusing on deletion.
See "Find when a file was deleted in Git"

git log --diff-filter=D --summary | \
  sed -n '/^commit/h;/\/some_dir\//{G;s/\ncommit \(.*\)/ \1/gp}'

On Mac:

git log --diff-filter=D --summary | \
  sed -n -e '/^commit/h' -e '\:/:{' -e G -e 's/\ncommit \(.*\)/ \1/gp' -e }

That would list all commits where files within a folder have disappeared.

VonC
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