CODEWITHSUNDEEP
gitandroid-studio
Michael Abyzov
Michael Abyzov

Reputation: 532

Git: save files history after moving directory

I want to move directory to another directory with history of files under git.

Now i have "defects" folder with classes

I want to move it into "inspections" directory like this:

After moving

But after moving i lose all my git history of files in "defects" directory.

Show history gimme an empty result for any file after moving directory

I tried moving with refractor in Android studio and also git mv defects inspections. Both gave me the same result: "show history" becames empty for any files after moving. I know that it's not first question by this theme, but i'm really don't know what i'm doing wrong. Please explain me :)

Upvotes: 1

Views: 571

Answers (1)

LightBender
LightBender

Reputation: 4253

Git does not keep track of files, it keeps track of content. In its brain, files are just metadata. If you ask it for the history a file, it looks up that content in the current snapshot, then tracks the content backward through the history.

If you want to track content across a move, you have to start from its current location and explicitly tell git to look for moved files.

git log --follow -- <file>

should get you where you're going.

Note that git doesn't explicitly track move data, but infers it based on a similarity index. If more than 50% of a file has changed, git will not recognize it as moved by default.

Upvotes: 2

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