Cherry-pick a Commit

Cherry picking is the act of picking a commit from one branch and applying it to another. It is mainly used when you don’t want to merge the whole branch and you just want some of the commits that were made to the branch. This operation can be useful for undoing changes, like when a commit has been accidentally made to the wrong branch. You can switch to the correct branch and cherry-pick the commit to where it should belong.

To cherry-pick a commit in a merged MR:

1. From the Repositories drop-down list, select the Git repository.
2. Click the History Graph toggle button and then enter the branch name(s) in the text box to the right of the toggle button or select them from the drop-down list.

   You can add multiple branches.

   
   
   Description of the illustration select-branches.png
   

3. On the right side of the page, click the Logs tab.
4. In the history graph, find the commit you want to pick and click its link.

   
   
   Description of the illustration history-graph-commit-cherry-pick-selected.png
   

   The Compare view is displayed, showing the branch that the change was merged into, the branch that contains the change being merged, and the change itself, at the file level.

   
   
   Description of the illustration compare-view-successful-merge.png
   

5. Click the Actions menu and select Cherry Pick....

   The Cherry-pick commit dialog box is displayed.

   
   
   Description of the illustration blank-cherry-pick-commit-dialog.png
   

6. In the Pick onto field, use the selector to choose a starting point (the target branch) in which the commit will be created.
7. Use this field to check whether the change you want to make is possible or not:
   • If you see the message, "The target branch already contains changes", select a different target branch. The branch you selected already has the change.
   • If you see the message, "There are conflicts and thus the commit can't be cherry-picked", you can't apply the commit because the interface doesn't provide a way to resolve the conflict. Click Cancel.
   • If you see the message, "Target branch requires review",
     1. Click the Start a new merge request with the changes check box.

        
        
        Description of the illustration cherry-pick-commit-mr-box-checked.png
        

        The display field right below the check box displays the name of the new review branch that is automatically created for you.

     2. Click OK and the New Merge Request wizard displays.

        
        
        Description of the illustration new-merge-request-wizard-branch-page.png
        

     3. The fields on the Branch page are already populated, so you just need to click Next to go to the Reviewers page.
     4. Select your reviewer(s).

        
        
        Description of the illustration select-reviewers-page.png
        

        Skip to the next substep or, optionally, click Next twice, bypassing the Details page and displaying the Description page, where you can enter a summary (and a description).

     5. Click Create to finish creating the merge request.

        See Create a Merge Request.

        The Merge Request page displays.

        
        
        Description of the illustration merge-request-page.png
        

        Click REQUIRES REVIEW to display the Branch Protections Settings page.

        
        
        Description of the illustration branch-protection-settings-page-cherry-pick-mr.png
        

   • If the dialog doesn't complain, click OK to add the commit to the target branch.

     
     
     Description of the illustration dialog-no-message.png
     

     A message, "The commit was successfully applied", is displayed after it succeeds.

     
     
     Description of the illustration success-message.png
     

     Click the link under the message and open the Compare view, where you can examine the changed files.

     
     
     Description of the illustration compare-view-successful-merge.png
     

     Return to the Git page, select the Logs view and, in the history graph, examine the results.

     
     
     Description of the illustration history-graph-cherry-pick-commit.png
     

Use the Git Command Line as an Alternative to the VB Studio Git User Interface

You can use the Git command line instead of using VB Studio's Git user interface to cherry-pick a commit in one branch and add it to another.

The git cherry-pick command is relatively straightforward:

git cherry-pick <commit-ID>

where <commit-ID> is a commit reference.

You need to use the git log command to find a command reference. There are several options you can use with git log to format and filter the results. For example, you could use the --graph option to draws an ASCII graph that represents the commit history's branch structure. This option is often used with the --oneline and --decorate commands so you can see which commit belongs to which branch. The --decorate flag makes the git log command display all of the references, such as branches, tags, and so on, that point to each commit.

You can also use the Git command line to create a merge request, when one is needed. See Create a Merge Request from the Command Line.