How do I change the author and committer name/email for multiple commits?

Fl225vio_Amieiro_802 0
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How do I change the author for a range of commits?

git-filter-branch git-rewrite-history version-control git
40 Answers

This answer uses git-filter-branch, for which the docs now give this warning:

git filter-branch has a plethora of pitfalls that can produce non-obvious manglings of the intended history rewrite (and can leave you with little time to investigate such problems since it has such abysmal performance). These safety and performance issues cannot be backward compatibly fixed and as such, its use is not recommended. Please use an alternative history filtering tool such as git filter-repo. If you still need to use git filter-branch, please carefully read SAFETY (and PERFORMANCE) to learn about the land mines of filter-branch, and then vigilantly avoid as many of the hazards listed there as reasonably possible.

Changing the author (or committer) would require rewriting all of the history. If you're okay with that and think it's worth it then you should check out git filter-branch. The manual page includes several examples to get you started. Also note that you can use environment variables to change the name of the author, committer, dates, etc. -- see the "Environment Variables" section of the git manual page.

Specifically, you can fix all the wrong author names and emails for all branches and tags with this command (source: GitHub help):

#!/bin/sh

git filter-branch --env-filter '
OLD_EMAIL="your-old-email@example.com"
CORRECT_NAME="Your Correct Name"
CORRECT_EMAIL="your-correct-email@example.com"
if [ "$GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL" = "$OLD_EMAIL" ]
then
    export GIT_COMMITTER_NAME="$CORRECT_NAME"
    export GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL="$CORRECT_EMAIL"
fi
if [ "$GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL" = "$OLD_EMAIL" ]
then
    export GIT_AUTHOR_NAME="$CORRECT_NAME"
    export GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL="$CORRECT_EMAIL"
fi
' --tag-name-filter cat -- --branches --tags

For using alternative history filtering tool git filter-repo, you can first install it and construct a git-mailmap according to the format of gitmailmap.

Proper Name <proper@email.xx> Commit Name <commit@email.xx>

And then run filter-repo with the created mailmap:

git filter-repo --mailmap git-mailmap
Pat_Notz_8250

One liner, but be careful if you have a multi-user repository - this will change all commits to have the same (new) author and committer.

git filter-branch -f --env-filter "GIT_AUTHOR_NAME='Newname'; GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL='new@email'; GIT_COMMITTER_NAME='Newname'; GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL='new@email';" HEAD

With linebreaks in the string (which is possible in bash):

git filter-branch -f --env-filter "
    GIT_AUTHOR_NAME='Newname'
    GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL='new@email'
    GIT_COMMITTER_NAME='Newname'
    GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL='new@email'
  " HEAD
Brian_Gianforcaro_34150

You can also do:

git filter-branch --commit-filter '
        if [ "$GIT_COMMITTER_NAME" = "<Old Name>" ];
        then
                GIT_COMMITTER_NAME="<New Name>";
                GIT_AUTHOR_NAME="<New Name>";
                GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL="<New Email>";
                GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL="<New Email>";
                git commit-tree "$@";
        else
                git commit-tree "$@";
        fi' HEAD

Note, if you are using this command in the Windows command prompt, then you need to use " instead of ':

git filter-branch --commit-filter "
        if [ "$GIT_COMMITTER_NAME" = "<Old Name>" ];
        then
                GIT_COMMITTER_NAME="<New Name>";
                GIT_AUTHOR_NAME="<New Name>";
                GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL="<New Email>";
                GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL="<New Email>";
                git commit-tree "$@";
        else
                git commit-tree "$@";
        fi" HEAD
user_52490

A single command to change the author for the last N commits:

git rebase -i HEAD~N -x "git commit --amend --author 'Author Name <author.name@mail.example>' --no-edit"

NOTES

  • replace HEAD~N with the reference until where you want to rewrite your commits. This can be a hash, HEAD~4, a branch name, ...
  • the --no-edit flag makes sure the git commit --amend doesn't ask an extra confirmation
  • when you use git rebase -i, you can manually select the commits where to change the author,

the file you edit will look like this:

pick 897fe9e simplify code a little
exec git commit --amend --author 'Author Name <author.name@mail.example>' --no-edit
pick abb60f9 add new feature
exec git commit --amend --author 'Author Name <author.name@mail.example>' --no-edit
pick dc18f70 bugfix
exec git commit --amend --author 'Author Name <author.name@mail.example>' --no-edit

You can then still modify some lines to see where you want to change the author. This gives you a nice middle ground between automation and control: you see the steps that will run, and once you save everything will be applied at once.

Note that if you already fixed the author information with git config user.name <your_name> and git config user.email <your_email>, you can also use this command:

git rebase -i HEAD~N -x "git commit --amend --reset-author --no-edit"
user_20829640

A safer alternative to git's filter-branch is filter-repo tool as suggested by git docs here.

git filter-repo --commit-callback '
  old_email = b"your-old-email@example.com"
  correct_name = b"Your Correct Name"
  correct_email = b"your-correct-email@example.com"
  
  if commit.committer_email == old_email :
    commit.committer_name = correct_name
    commit.committer_email = correct_email

  if commit.author_email == old_email : 
    commit.author_name = correct_name
    commit.author_email = correct_email
  '

The above command mirrors the logic used in this script but uses filter-repo instead of filter-branch.

The code body after commit-callback option is basically python code used for processing commits. You can write your own logic in python here. See more about commit object and its attributes here.

Since filter-repo tool is not bundled with git you need to install it separately.

See Prerequisties and Installation Guide

If you have a python env >= 3.5, you can use pip to install it.

pip3 install git-filter-repo

Note: It is strongly recommended to try filter-repo tool on a fresh clone. Also remotes are removed once the operation is done. Read more on why remotes are removed here. Also read the limitations of this tool under INTERNALS section.

user_101559360

I use the following to rewrite the author for an entire repository, including tags and all branches:

git filter-branch --tag-name-filter cat --env-filter "
  export GIT_AUTHOR_NAME='New name';
  export GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL='New email'
" -- --all

Then, as described in the MAN page of filter-branch, remove all original refs backed up by filter-branch (this is destructive, backup first):

git for-each-ref --format="%(refname)" refs/original/ | \
xargs -n 1 git update-ref -d
user_791110

I adapted this solution which works by ingesting a simple author-conv-file (format is the same as one for git-cvsimport). It works by changing all users as defined in the author-conv-file across all branches.

We used this in conjunction with cvs2git to migrate our repository from cvs to git.

i.e. Sample author-conv-file

john=John Doe <john.doe@hotmail.com>
jill=Jill Doe <jill.doe@hotmail.com>

The script:

 #!/bin/bash

 export $authors_file=author-conv-file

 git filter-branch -f --env-filter '

 get_name () {
     grep "^$1=" "$authors_file" |
     sed "s/^.*=\(.*\) <.*>$/\1/"
 }

 get_email () {
     grep "^$1=" "$authors_file" |
     sed "s/^.*=.* <\(.*\)>$/\1/"
 }

 GIT_AUTHOR_NAME=$(get_name $GIT_COMMITTER_NAME) &&
     GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL=$(get_email $GIT_COMMITTER_NAME) &&
     GIT_COMMITTER_NAME=$GIT_AUTHOR_NAME &&
     GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL=$GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL &&
     export GIT_AUTHOR_NAME GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL &&
     export GIT_COMMITTER_NAME GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL
 ' -- --all
user_521760

The fastest, easiest way to do this is to use the --exec argument of git rebase:

git rebase -i -p --exec 'git commit --amend --reset-author --no-edit'

This will create a todo-list that looks like this:

pick ef11092 Blah blah blah
exec git commit --amend --reset-author --no-edit
pick 52d6391 Blah bloh bloo
exec git commit --amend --reset-author --no-edit
pick 30ebbfe Blah bluh bleh
exec git commit --amend --reset-author --no-edit
...

and this will work all automatically, which works when you have hundreds of commits.

user_3094120

Note that git stores two different e-mail addresses, one for the committer (the person who committed the change) and another one for the author (the person who wrote the change).

The committer information isn't displayed in most places, but you can see it with git log -1 --format=%cn,%ce (or use show instead of log to specify a particular commit).

While changing the author of your last commit is as simple as git commit --amend --author "Author Name <email@example.com>", there is no one-liner or argument to do the same to the committer information.

The solution is to (temporarily, or not) change your user information, then amend the commit, which will update the committer to your current information:

git config user.email my_other_email@example.com 
git commit --amend
user_22459100

For reset ALL commits (including first commit) to current user and current timestamp:

git rebase --root --exec "git commit --amend --no-edit --date 'now' --reset-author"
user_20519380

I want to add my Example too. I want to create a bash_function with given parameter.

this works in mint-linux-17.3

# $1 => email to change, $2 => new_name, $3 => new E-Mail

function git_change_user_config_for_commit {

 # defaults
 WRONG_EMAIL=${1:-"you_wrong_mail@hello.world"}
 NEW_NAME=${2:-"your name"}
 NEW_EMAIL=${3:-"new_mail@hello.world"}

 git filter-branch -f --env-filter "
  if [ \$GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL = '$WRONG_EMAIL' ]; then
    export GIT_COMMITTER_NAME='$NEW_NAME'
    export GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL='$NEW_EMAIL'
  fi
  if [ \$GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL = '$WRONG_EMAIL' ]; then
    export GIT_AUTHOR_NAME='$NEW_NAME'
    export GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL='$NEW_EMAIL'
  fi
 " --tag-name-filter cat -- --branches --tags;
}
user_12828850

If you want to (easily) change the author for the current branch I would use something like this:

# update author for everything since origin/master
git rebase \
  -i origin/master \
  --exec 'git commit --amend --no-edit --author="Author Name <author.name@email.co.uk>"'
user_8462520
user_36888090

I would like to contribute with a modification of @Rognon answer. This answer is just another alternative in case the selected answer or others don't work for you (in my particular issue that was the case):

Objective: You will fix one or more authors with a correct one in the ALL the history, and you will get a clean history without duplicates. This method works by replacing 'master' branch with a 'clean' branch (its not using merge/rebase)

NOTE: Anyone using the "master" repository may need to checkout it again (after performing these steps) before pushing, as merge may fail.

We will use a new branch named "clean" to perform the operations (assuming you want to fix "master"):

git checkout -b clean

(be sure you are in the "clean" branch: git branch)

Modify the following script (replacing the email addresses and names). Note that this script expects two wrong emails/authors (as example), so if you only need to fix a single author, you can remove the second part of the condition or leave it like that (as it will be ignored as it won't match).

Execute the script.

#/bin/bash

git filter-branch --force --commit-filter '
        if [ "$GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL" = "wrong1@example.com" -o "$GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL" = "wrong2@example.com" ];
        then
                export GIT_COMMITTER_NAME="John Doe";
                export GIT_AUTHOR_NAME="John Doe";
                export GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL="correct@example.com";
                export GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL="correct@example.com";
        fi;
        git commit-tree "$@"
' --tag-name-filter cat -- --all

It has to report: Ref 'refs/heads/clean' was rewritten. If it reports "unchanged", maybe the email(s) entered in the script is wrong.

Confirm the history has been corrected with: git log

If you are using github/gitlab (recommended = safe):

  1. create the "clean" branch in remote:

git push --set-upstream origin clean

  1. set "clean" branch as default branch
  2. remove "master" (be sure everything is as expected before doing this).
  3. Create a new branch "master" based in "clean" branch.
  4. After confirming all is good, you can remove "clean" branch now (alternative you can just rename it).

If are not using github/gitlab or you prefer doing it by command:

  1. Delete the master branch from local:

git branch -d master

  1. Rename the branch:

git branch -m clean master

  1. Push it (be sure you "master" is unprotected)

git push --force origin master

user_1965070

For all the commits, my solution:

git rebase -i --root -x "git commit --amend --author 'bedorlan <bedorlan@gmail.com>' --no-edit"
user_23668700

All the answers above rewrite the history of the repository. As long as the name to change has not been used by multiple authors and especially if the repository has been shared and the commit is old I'd prefer to use .mailmap, documented at https://git-scm.com/docs/git-shortlog. It allows mapping incorrect names/emails to the correct one without modifying the repo history. You can use lines like:

Proper Name <proper@email.xx> <root@localhost>
user_35470460

For those under windows, you could also use the git-rocket-filter tool.

From the documentation:

Change commit author name and email:

git-rocket-filter --branch TestBranch --commit-filter '
    if (commit.AuthorName.Contains("Jim")) {   
        commit.AuthorName = "Paul"; 
        commit.AuthorEmail = "paul@company.com"; 
    }
user_7173720

I have tried the scripts above it did not work for me, this fixed my issue:

use Git's "filter-branch" command. It allows you to batch-process a (potentially large) number of commits with a script. You can run the below sample script in your repository (filling in real values for the old and new email and name):

git filter-branch --env-filter '
WRONG_EMAIL="wrong@example.com"
NEW_NAME="New Name Value"
NEW_EMAIL="correct@example.com"

if [ "$GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL" = "$WRONG_EMAIL" ]
then
    export GIT_COMMITTER_NAME="$NEW_NAME"
    export GIT_COMMITTER_EMAIL="$NEW_EMAIL"
fi
if [ "$GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL" = "$WRONG_EMAIL" ]
then
    export GIT_AUTHOR_NAME="$NEW_NAME"
    export GIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL="$NEW_EMAIL"
fi
' --tag-name-filter cat -- --branches --tags

See more details here

user_90396460
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