gitbak

Overview ¶

Package main implements gitbak, an automatic commit safety net

gitbak automatically commits changes to git at regular intervals, providing a safety net for programming sessions. It's especially valuable for pair programming, long coding sessions, or exploratory coding where you want to focus on the work rather than remembering to commit. It runs as a background process that monitors your repository and creates sequential, numbered commits.

While gitbak creates automatic checkpoint commits, you can still make your own meaningful manual commits at important milestones. This powerful combination gives you both a detailed safety net AND a clean, meaningful commit history - the best of both worlds.

Command-Line Documentation ¶

This package provides the command-line interface for the gitbak tool. For additional documentation on the underlying functionality, see: https://pkg.go.dev/github.com/bashhack/gitbak

Features ¶

• Automatically commits changes at specified intervals (default: 5 minutes)
• Creates a dedicated branch for backup commits (configurable)
• Handles concurrent executions safely with file locking
• Continuous tracking with sequential commit numbering
• Support for continuing sessions after breaks or interruptions
• Robust error handling with configurable retry limits
• Smart retry logic that resets on different errors or successful operations
• Terminal disconnect protection (SIGHUP handling)

Basic Usage ¶

gitbak                     # Run with default settings (5-minute interval)
gitbak -interval 2         # Run with a custom interval (2 minutes)
gitbak -branch "my-branch" # Run with a custom branch name
gitbak -continue           # Continue from an existing gitbak session
gitbak -no-branch          # Use current branch instead of creating a new one

Configuration Options ¶

The tool can be configured via command-line flags or environment variables:

-interval        Minutes between commit checks (env: INTERVAL_MINUTES)
-branch          Branch name to use (env: BRANCH_NAME)
-prefix          Commit message prefix (env: COMMIT_PREFIX)
-no-branch       Stay on current branch (env: CREATE_BRANCH=false)
-continue        Continue existing session (env: CONTINUE_SESSION=true)
-show-no-changes Show messages when no changes detected (env: SHOW_NO_CHANGES=true)
-quiet           Hide informational messages (env: VERBOSE=false)
-max-retries     Max consecutive identical errors before exiting (env: MAX_RETRIES)
-debug           Enable detailed logging (env: DEBUG=true)
-version         Print version information and exit
-logo            Display ASCII logo and exit

Session Continuation vs Branch Creation ¶

Two important flags control how gitbak interacts with Git branches:

1. -no-branch: Tells gitbak to use the current branch instead of creating a new one. When this flag is not specified, gitbak creates a new timestamped branch.

2. -continue: Used when resuming a previous gitbak session. This flag:

   a. Automatically stays on the current branch (implicitly includes -no-branch behavior)

   b. Identifies the last commit number used by gitbak and continues numbering sequentially

   c. Preserves branch history and continues tracking from where you left off

After Your Session ¶

When your session is complete, you can:

1. Squash merge all gitbak commits into a single commit:

git checkout main
git merge --squash gitbak-<timestamp>
git commit -m "Add feature X from pair programming session"

2. Cherry-pick specific changes from the gitbak branch:

git checkout main
git cherry-pick <commit-hash>

3. Merge the branch as-is to keep all individual commits

See https://github.com/bashhack/gitbak for additional documentation.