rewrite commit authors using git-filter-repo

Previously, people used git-filter-branch to rewrite commit history but it is no longer used or used less as it’s somewhat deprecated as of Git 2.24, Q4 2019. Instead, I can now use git-filter-repo.

git filter-repo is not only faster than the git filter-branch but also equipped with more capabilities.

Installation

  • brew
    • Since I’m using macOS, I can use Homebrew to easily install it.
    brew install git-filter-repo
    • After the installation, I can use either git filter-repo or git-filter-repo with the dash.
  • pip
    • Alternatively, I can use pip to install the package:
    python3 -m pip install --user git-filter-repo

Make sure the path to python is added on the path, otherwise I’ll need to use absolute path to where it is installed.

<PATH TO PYTHON>/<VERSION>/bin/git-filter-repo