git-sweep

Synopsis

git-sweep [-n] [-f] [-l] [-r <remote>] [-k <branch>]...

Description

Sweeps up after merged work. Fetches and prunes the remote, fast-forwards the local default branch, and deletes every branch whose content is already in the default branch:

Local branches merged into <remote>/<default>, by any strategy: merge commit, fast-forward, rebase, or squash.
Local branches whose remote branch is gone. Gone branches with unmerged commits are kept unless -f is given.
Remote branches merged into <remote>/<default>, unless they are the head of an open pull request (a local branch tracking one is kept too).

Open pull requests are listed with whatever is available: gh, tea or glab, else curl with a token from the environment that belongs to the remote’s host, else anonymous curl for a public repository. If none of them works, remote branches are listed but not deleted. Local cleanup never needs any of them.

Never deleted: the default branch, main, master, develop, dev, trunk, staging, production, gh-pages, release/*, any -k branch, branches checked out in another worktree, local branches created but never committed to, and any branch with unmerged commits whose remote branch still exists. Unmerged remote branches are never deleted, even with -f.

If the current branch is deleted, git-sweep switches to the default branch first; if tracked files have uncommitted changes, it keeps the branch instead. If the fetch fails, it carries on offline against the last fetched state and skips remote deletion: anything merged into a stale <remote>/<default> is merged into the current one too.

Every local deletion prints the branch’s last commit, so it can be restored with git branch <name> <sha>.

Arguments


`-n, --dry-run`	Print the plan; fetch, but change nothing else
`-f, --force`	Also delete gone local branches with unmerged commits
`-l, --local-only`	Never delete remote branches
`-r, --remote NAME`	Remote to sync and prune (default: origin)
`-k, --keep BRANCH`	Never delete BRANCH, local or remote; repeatable
`-h, --help`	Show this help message

Exit Status


`0`	Cleanup complete, or a dry run (`-n`) finished
`1`	A deletion failed (e.g. branch protection on the remote)
`2`	Unknown option, unexpected argument, not a git work tree, or no default branch could be found

Notes

The same checks drive the prune-it skill in rootiest-ai, so an agent and this function make the same decisions.

Example

git-sweep --dry-run
git-sweep
git-sweep --force --keep wip/experiment

Dependencies: git, _git_sweep_merged, _git_sweep_open_prs

Classification: network, destructive

Used by: git-clean