how to remove a renamed file from last git commit?

Question

I know how to

• Remove files from last git commit
• Remove a file change from a git commit

but what I want is to exclude the renamed file from last git commit, but retain anything else (as git mv get into my commit unintentionally).

How can I do that?

(Seems I can only revert everything or not at all...)

Answer 1

You can search the internet for "git how can I change my latest commit content", you will find documentation pages such as :

• Git commit --amend and other methods of rewriting history (atlassian.com)
• How can I add a file to the last commit in Git? (SO)
• amending a commit after it has been pushed (SO)

---

One generic way to "change the latest commit" is to edit files and git add them as you want, then run git commit --amend.

This works for any kind of modifications: the commit will simply contain the new content you git added.

For example:

• to "undo" a git mv old.txt new.txt:

git mv new.txt old.txt
git commit --amend

• to still remove old.txt but not add new.txt in the commit:

git rm --cached new.txt  # --cached will make git keep the file on disk
git commit --amend

• to edit a typo:

# edit file foo.txt ...
git add foo.txt
git commit --amend

etc ...