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NAME

       git-merge-base - Find as good common ancestors as possible for a merge

SYNOPSIS

       git merge-base [-a|--all] <commit> <commit>...
       git merge-base [-a|--all] --octopus <commit>...
       git merge-base --is-ancestor <commit> <commit>
       git merge-base --independent <commit>...
       git merge-base --fork-point <ref> [<commit>]

DESCRIPTION

       git merge-base finds best common ancestor(s) between two commits to use in a three-way
       merge. One common ancestor is better than another common ancestor if the latter is an
       ancestor of the former. A common ancestor that does not have any better common ancestor is
       a best common ancestor, i.e. a merge base. Note that there can be more than one merge base
       for a pair of commits.

OPERATION MODES

       As the most common special case, specifying only two commits on the command line means
       computing the merge base between the given two commits.

       More generally, among the two commits to compute the merge base from, one is specified by
       the first commit argument on the command line; the other commit is a (possibly
       hypothetical) commit that is a merge across all the remaining commits on the command line.

       As a consequence, the merge base is not necessarily contained in each of the commit
       arguments if more than two commits are specified. This is different from git-show-
       branch(1) when used with the --merge-base option.

       --octopus
           Compute the best common ancestors of all supplied commits, in preparation for an n-way
           merge. This mimics the behavior of git show-branch --merge-base.

       --independent
           Instead of printing merge bases, print a minimal subset of the supplied commits with
           the same ancestors. In other words, among the commits given, list those which cannot
           be reached from any other. This mimics the behavior of git show-branch --independent.

       --is-ancestor
           Check if the first <commit> is an ancestor of the second <commit>, and exit with
           status 0 if true, or with status 1 if not. Errors are signaled by a non-zero status
           that is not 1.

       --fork-point
           Find the point at which a branch (or any history that leads to <commit>) forked from
           another branch (or any reference) <ref>. This does not just look for the common
           ancestor of the two commits, but also takes into account the reflog of <ref> to see if
           the history leading to <commit> forked from an earlier incarnation of the branch <ref>
           (see discussion on this mode below).

OPTIONS

       -a, --all
           Output all merge bases for the commits, instead of just one.

DISCUSSION

       Given two commits A and B, git merge-base A B will output a commit which is reachable from
       both A and B through the parent relationship.

       For example, with this topology:

                    o---o---o---B
                   /
           ---o---1---o---o---o---A

       the merge base between A and B is 1.

       Given three commits A, B and C, git merge-base A B C will compute the merge base between A
       and a hypothetical commit M, which is a merge between B and C. For example, with this
       topology:

                  o---o---o---o---C
                 /
                /   o---o---o---B
               /   /
           ---2---1---o---o---o---A

       the result of git merge-base A B C is 1. This is because the equivalent topology with a
       merge commit M between B and C is:

                  o---o---o---o---o
                 /                 \
                /   o---o---o---o---M
               /   /
           ---2---1---o---o---o---A

       and the result of git merge-base A M is 1. Commit 2 is also a common ancestor between A
       and M, but 1 is a better common ancestor, because 2 is an ancestor of 1. Hence, 2 is not a
       merge base.

       The result of git merge-base --octopus A B C is 2, because 2 is the best common ancestor
       of all commits.

       When the history involves criss-cross merges, there can be more than one best common
       ancestor for two commits. For example, with this topology:

           ---1---o---A
               \ /
                X
               / \
           ---2---o---o---B

       both 1 and 2 are merge-bases of A and B. Neither one is better than the other (both are
       best merge bases). When the --all option is not given, it is unspecified which best one is
       output.

       A common idiom to check "fast-forward-ness" between two commits A and B is (or at least
       used to be) to compute the merge base between A and B, and check if it is the same as A,
       in which case, A is an ancestor of B. You will see this idiom used often in older scripts.

           A=$(git rev-parse --verify A)
           if test "$A" = "$(git merge-base A B)"
           then
                   ... A is an ancestor of B ...
           fi

       In modern git, you can say this in a more direct way:

           if git merge-base --is-ancestor A B
           then
                   ... A is an ancestor of B ...
           fi

       instead.

DISCUSSION ON FORK-POINT MODE

       After working on the topic branch created with git checkout -b topic origin/master, the
       history of remote-tracking branch origin/master may have been rewound and rebuilt, leading
       to a history of this shape:

                            o---B1
                           /
           ---o---o---B2--o---o---o---B (origin/master)
                   \
                    B3
                     \
                      Derived (topic)

       where origin/master used to point at commits B3, B2, B1 and now it points at B, and your
       topic branch was started on top of it back when origin/master was at B3. This mode uses
       the reflog of origin/master to find B3 as the fork point, so that the topic can be rebased
       on top of the updated origin/master by:

           $ fork_point=$(git merge-base --fork-point origin/master topic)
           $ git rebase --onto origin/master $fork_point topic

SEE ALSO

       git-rev-list(1), git-show-branch(1), git-merge(1)

GIT

       Part of the git(1) suite