List or checkout recently used branches in git

git-recent-branches

#!/usr/bin/env python3
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
"""
List the most recent branches you have been working on, and checkout any of them.

# Install

Put this file somewhere in your PATH, and set execution permissions.
Git will recognize it as the "recent-branches" subcommand.

# Usage

Without positional argument, it shows the last 10 most recently used branches.
You can pass -n <number> to see more.

$ git recent-branches
1 - feature/EN-634
2 - feature/en-583_3
3 * master
4 - HOTFIX/spotify
5 - tests_factories
6 - feature/en-583_2
7 - _prod/workers/orders_py3
8 - prueba
9 - _prod/workers/products_py3
10 - staging

Passing a number will checkout the branch listed in that position.

$ git recent-branches 5
Switched to branch 'tests_factories'
Your branch is up to date with 'origin/tests_factories'.

In the list, the row with "*" (instead "-") is the current branch.
"""

import argparse
import re
import subprocess
from collections import OrderedDict

pattern = re.compile(r"checkout: moving from ([A-Za-z0-9_\/\-\.]+) to")

parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(description="Recent branches")
parser.add_argument("index", type=int, nargs="?", help="Move to the i-th branch in the list")
parser.add_argument("--limit", "-n", type=int, default=10, help="Show until the n-th branch")
parser.add_argument("--force", "-f", action="store_true", help="Force checkout")

args = parser.parse_args()

output = subprocess.check_output(["git", "reflog"], text=True)

# OrderedList.fromkeys(list).keys() works as a filter of repeated items in list
# keeping the first occurrence of them. A poor-man sorted set.
branches = list(OrderedDict.fromkeys(re.findall(pattern, output)).keys())


if args.index:
    # use sw instead switch if available
    # install sw from https://gist.github.com/mgaitan/d9a3523d79cd5f9fbfd626f646f0560b
    use_sw = subprocess.call(["git", "sw"], stderr=subprocess.DEVNULL) == 2 and not args.force

    cmd = ["git", "sw" if use_sw else "switch"]
    if args.force:
        cmd.append("-f")
    cmd.append(branches[args.index - 1])
    subprocess.call(cmd)
else:
    current = subprocess.check_output(["git", "branch", "--show-current"], text=True).strip()
    for i, branch in enumerate(branches[: args.limit], 1):
        print(f"{i} {'*' if current == branch else '-'} {branch}")

Love this idea, would be nice to have a way to say only show the top n branches. Ie something like:

git-recent-branches -n 5

to show the 5 most recent, rather than always show all. I have a few repos I interact with where there's a large number of branches, but only interact with a small handful.

@pzelnip, thanks for the idea. I've just implemented it, with a default to top 10 most recently used branches

Nice!

See also https://gist.github.com/mgaitan/d9a3523d79cd5f9fbfd626f646f0560b

I forked and added it to ask to switch branch
https://gist.github.com/alvarmaciel/884660733fdb7c6ad9603ceb23d239ca

why not simply use fzf

git switch `git branch | fzf| tr -d '[:space:]'`