How to push a file to past time?

Question

Yesterday, I made changes on a project file but forgot to commit and push it on github. I don\'t want that my contribution streak breaks after 51 days..so I would like to pu

Answer 1

Yesterday, I made changes on a project file but forgot to commit and push it on github

As far as I know, GitHub contribution graphs rely on commit datetimes, not push datetimes. FWIW, there are even tools abusing this to use the contribution graph as a drawing board (cf. this google search).

So the easy way would be to

• Commit locally now

• Then rewrite your latest commit to change the authorship date (pick the time and timezone you'd like) with something like git commit --amend --date="Wed Jul 12 14:17 2014 +0900"

• Push

Answer 2

I have that script in my path, called git-rcd, which changes GIT_COMMITTER_DATE and GIT_AUTHOR_DATE of any commit you want (not just the last one)

#!/bin/bash
# commit
# date YYYY-mm-dd HH:MM:SS

commit="$1" datecal="$2"
temp_branch="temp-rebasing-branch"
current_branch="$(git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD)"

date_timestamp=$(date -d "$datecal" +%s)
date_r=$(date -R -d "$datecal")
echo "datecal=$datecal => date_timestamp=$date_timestamp date_r=$date_r"

if [[ -z "$commit" ]]; then
    exit 0
fi

git checkout -b "$temp_branch" "$commit"
GIT_COMMITTER_DATE="$date_timestamp" GIT_AUTHOR_DATE="$date_timestamp" git commit --amend --no-edit --date "$date_r"
git checkout "$current_branch"
git rebase --autostash --committer-date-is-author-date "$commit" --onto "$temp_branch"
git branch -d "$temp_branch"

What that allows me is take the last commit I just did and type:

git rcd @ '1 day ago'

And presto! My last commit has now been done yesterday.

It changes any commit you want:

git rcd @~2 '1 day ago'

That would only change the HEAD~2 (and not the HEAD~ or HEAD)

The script works even on Windows.

Once the change is done, push (or git push --force if you pushed before with the wrong date). And your streak is preserved.

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Note (2020), David Fullerton mentions in the comments:

Getting this working on Mac OS X required:

• installing coreutils to get GNU date and then
• updating the script to use gdate