Delete local Git branches after deleting them on the remote repo

Question

I want to have my local and remote repositories always in sync in terms of branches.

After a Pull Request review on GitHub, I merge and remove my branch there (remot

Answer 1

Very simple solution: remove your local repo and clone the remote one anew. May not seem very elegant, but it is simple and you'll understand exactly what you're doing without reading man pages :-).

Answer 2

None of this was working for me. You can see my other answer here: https://stackoverflow.com/a/34969726/550454

But essentially, I now have this in my ~/.gitconfig:

[alias]
  prune-branches = !git remote prune origin && git branch -vv | grep ': gone]' | awk '{print $1}' | xargs -r git branch -d

Answer 3

For people using powershell, this is the equivalent to the answer above:

git branch -vv | Select-String -Pattern ': gone]' | ForEach-Object{($_ -split "\s+")[1]} | %{ git branch -D $_ }

1. Filter all the branches that are marked as gone
2. Call git branch -D on each of the found branches

Answer 4

I had the same question and I could solve it with a simple command line:

git branch -d $(git branch --merged | grep -v "master")

First of all, do a git pull origin to make sure it will work fine.

The subshell first returns all branches that were merged to your current branch (make sure you have master branch checked out!!!), except for master which can be on the list if you don't use grep -v. Then, all merged branches will be simply removed from your local repo by git branch -d <branch_1> <branch_n>

Answer 5

The voted answer does have the potential to delete master. Consdier the below practical example.

I had two feature branches hemen_README and hemen_BASEBOX which were merged into develop, and then develop was merged into master. The feature branches hemen_README and hemen_BASEBOX were deleted remotely but were still showing up locally. Also i am not on master locally, but on develop.

In that case

    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git branch -v -a
    * develop                      671ad6c Merged in hemen_README (pull request #1)
        hemen_BASEBOX                a535c0f added global exec paths to puppet manifest
        hemen_README                 ba87489 Updated Readme with considerable details
        master                       8980894 [behind 7] Initial Vagrantfile, works for vagrant up. Also initial .gitignore
        remotes/origin/develop       671ad6c Merged in hemen_README (pull request #1)
        remotes/origin/hemen_BASEBOX a535c0f added global exec paths to puppet manifest
        remotes/origin/hemen_README  ba87489 Updated Readme with considerable details
        remotes/origin/master        2f093ce Merged in develop (pull request #3)

So if i run the above partial command

    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git branch --merged | grep -v "\*"
        hemen_BASEBOX
        hemen_README
        master

Notice that it shows master too, which will eventually be deleted.

In any case I was able to do it. I am sharing my session log with you on how I achieved that.

    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git remote prune origin --dry-run
    Pruning origin
    URL: git@bitbucket.org:hemenkapadiapublic/vagrant-webdev.git
     * [would prune] origin/hemen_BASEBOX
     * [would prune] origin/hemen_README
    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git remote prune origin 
    Pruning origin
    URL: git@bitbucket.org:hemenkapadiapublic/vagrant-webdev.git
     * [pruned] origin/hemen_BASEBOX
     * [pruned] origin/hemen_README

I just checked whay will be pruned and then pruned it. looking at branch command below we have taken care of remotes

    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git branch -v -a
    * develop                671ad6c Merged in hemen_README (pull request #1)
        hemen_BASEBOX          a535c0f added global exec paths to puppet manifest
        hemen_README           ba87489 Updated Readme with considerable details
        master                 8980894 [behind 7] Initial Vagrantfile, works for vagrant up. Also initial .gitignore
        remotes/origin/develop 671ad6c Merged in hemen_README (pull request #1)
        remotes/origin/master  2f093ce Merged in develop (pull request #3)

Now go ahead and delete local branches

    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git branch -d hemen_BASEBOX 
    Deleted branch hemen_BASEBOX (was a535c0f).
    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git branch -d hemen_README
    Deleted branch hemen_README (was ba87489).

Good now the branches are as desired.

    hemen@hemen-MXC061:~/data/projects/vagrant-webdev$ git branch -v -a
    * develop                671ad6c Merged in hemen_README (pull request #1)
        master                 8980894 [behind 7] Initial Vagrantfile, works for vagrant up. Also initial .gitignore
        remotes/origin/develop 671ad6c Merged in hemen_README (pull request #1)
        remotes/origin/master  2f093ce Merged in develop (pull request #3)

Answer 6

This should work to avoid deleting the master and development branches with the accepted solution:

git branch --merged | egrep -v "^\*|master|development" | xargs -n 1 git branch -d