Squash my last X commits together using Git

Question

How can I squash my last X commits together into one commit using Git?

Answer 1

This is super-duper kludgy, but in a kind of cool way, so I'll just toss it into the ring:

GIT_EDITOR='f() { if [ "$(basename $1)" = "git-rebase-todo" ]; then sed -i "2,\$s/pick/squash/" $1; else vim $1; fi }; f' git rebase -i foo~5 foo

Translation: provide a new "editor" for git which, if the filename to be edited is git-rebase-todo (the interactive rebase prompt) changes all but the first "pick" to "squash", and otherwise spawns vim - so that when you're prompted to edit the squashed commit message, you get vim. (And obviously I was squashing the last five commits on branch foo, but you could change that however you like.)

I'd probably do what Mark Longair suggested, though.