Remove deleted files from git history

Question

I\'m trying to split a subproject off of my git repository. However unlike in Detach (move) subdirectory into separate Git repository I don\'t have it in it\'s own subdirect

Answer 1

Ok now I'm trying with the following technique, will report back if it worked, because it seems to be quite long running: On a zsh or bash ON A CLONED Repository

git log --diff-filter=D --summary <start_commit>..HEAD | egrep -o '*[[:alnum:]]*(/[[:alnum:].]*)+$' > deleted.txt

to get all deleted files

for del in `cat deleted.txt`
do
    git filter-branch --index-filter "git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch $del" --prune-empty -- --all
    # The following seems to be necessary every time
    # because otherwise git won't overwrite refs/original
    git reset --hard
    git for-each-ref --format="%(refname)" refs/original/ | xargs -n 1 git update-ref -d
    git reflog expire --expire=now --all
    git gc --aggressive --prune=now
done;

This might be extremly dangeours for your data so only try on clones.

Answer 2

Here are some instructions to do what you want.

This will remove file_to_remove:

git filter-branch --index-filter 'git rm --cached --ignore-unmatch file_to_remove' --prune-empty -- --all