Record file copy operation with Git

Question

When I move a file in git using git-mv the status shows that the file has been renamed and even if I alter some portions it still considers to be almost the same thing (whic

Answer 1

2020-05-19: The following solution has the advantages of not changing the log of the original file, not creating a merge conflict, and being shorter.

You can force Git to detect the history of the copied file in three commits:

• Instead of copying, switch to a new branch and move the file to its new location there.
• Re-add the original file there.
• Merge the new branch to the original branch with the no-fast-forward option --no-ff.

Credits to Raymond Chen. What follows is his procedure. Say the file is named orig, and you want the duplicate to be named apple:

git checkout -b dup # create and switch to branch

git mv orig apple # make the duplicate
git commit -m "duplicate orig to apple"

git checkout HEAD~ orig # bring back the original
git commit -m "restore orig"

git checkout - # switch back to source branch
git merge --no-ff dup # merge dup into source branch

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The former solution had four commits:

• Instead of copying, switch to a new branch and move the file to its new location there.
• Switch to the original branch and rename the file.
• Merge the new branch into the original branch, resolving the trivial conflict by keeping both files.
• Restore the original filename in a separate commit.

(Solution taken from https://stackoverflow.com/a/44036771/1389680.)