Menu
Is it true that git rebase is more prone to conflicts than git merge? I have heard that before and it is referenced in this post
I am speculating based on anecdata here, but I suspect the general anxiety around rebasing stems from two primary places:
- Due to the mechanics of git rebase, merge conflicts are more frequent and seemingly harder to deal with
The author doesn't go into detail to justify that claim, but it is not the first time I hear it.
I have heard and understand the point that because rebase replays commit by commit you will end up with the same conflict several times, but I have never encountered that. Maybe the rerere behaviour is now default in git rebase?
I am trying to propose a rebase policy in my team but I want to address this issue if it is accurate.
Honestly, I would expect to have the same number of conflicts since a change in both branches will end up with a conflict, regardless of rebase or merge. In other words, the conflict is not caused by the convergence of the branches at the end, it is cause by parallel changes to the same line
764
When you perform a git rebase operation, you're typically moving commits around. Because of this, you might get into a situation where a merge conflict is introduced. That means that two of your commits modified the same line in the same file, and Git doesn't know which change to apply.
The Rebase Option But, instead of using a merge commit, rebasing re-writes the project history by creating brand new commits for each commit in the original branch. The major benefit of rebasing is that you get a much cleaner project history. First, it eliminates the unnecessary merge commits required by git merge .
Rebasing is not going to magically remove all merge conflicts. In fact, you may encounter conflicts while rebasing. Sometimes, you will have to repeatedly resolve the same conflict while rebasing. However, merge conflicts happen because multiple changes happen to the same chunk of code simultaneously.
Git merge is a command that allows you to merge branches from Git. Git rebase is a command that allows developers to integrate changes from one branch to another. In Git Merge logs will be showing the complete history of the merging of commits.
You'll end up with more conflicts with a rebase if you have multiple commits. This is because when you rebase you'll have to solve conflicts for each commit. That means if you're trying to rebase a branch that is 5 commits ahead of your master and you introduced a merge conflict in the first of those 5 commits you'll have to resolve that conflict in each of the following commits.
Rebasing often should fix the issue above. Also it's worth mentioning that if you want to squash down to a single commit there is a simpler strategy than rebase.
Let's say you have 5 commits you want to merge in master, but it's only one feature that can easily be described in one commit with a descriptive message.
git fetch
git merge origin/master
git reset --soft origin/master
git commit
If you just want a single commit this is way easier and accomplishes the same thing as rebasing.
89
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With
