git-recent

List local branches by their last commit, newest first.

Synopsis

git recent [-n count] [options]
git-recent [-n count] [options]

Description

git branch lists branches in alphabetical order, which is rarely the order you need. After a week of switching between tickets, the question is "what was I working on on Tuesday?", and the answer is the branch with the newest commit.

git recent lists your local branches sorted by the date of their last commit, newest first, 10 by default. Each line has the branch name, how long ago its last commit was, and that commit's subject. A * marks the branch you are on, as in git branch.

It only reads. It never switches branches or changes anything.

The dates are commit dates, the time a commit was last written. A rebase or git commit --amend writes the commit again, so a branch you rebased this morning shows as this morning even when the work is older.

It is a script named git-recent in toolbelt's bin folder. Git runs any program named git-NAME on your PATH as git NAME.

Options

-n3 and --count=3 work the same as -n 3.

Output

  main              2 hours ago   tfcheck: add trivy section
* feat/ctx-warn     5 hours ago   ctx: flag production contexts

• The first column is * for the current branch and a space for the others.
• The columns line up to the longest name and the longest age in the list.
• Ages come from git's own relative dates, such as 26 hours ago, 3 days ago or 5 weeks ago.
• A subject longer than 50 characters is cut to 47 and ends in ..., so a line fits in 80 columns.

Help and the man page

git recent -h and git-recent --help print the help. git recent --help makes git open the man page git-recent(1), which toolbelt installs from this document.

Pass-through

None. git recent runs one git for-each-ref command, and -v prints it.

Needs

git 2.30 or newer, from the git package on every distro.

Examples

What was I working on

$ git recent -n 3
  main              2 hours ago   tfcheck: add trivy section
* feat/ctx-warn     5 hours ago   ctx: flag production contexts
  fix/kwhy-pending  26 hours ago  kwhy: hint for Pending pods

Every branch, oldest at the bottom

$ git recent
  main                 2 hours ago   tfcheck: add trivy section
* feat/ctx-warn        5 hours ago   ctx: flag production contexts
  fix/kwhy-pending     26 hours ago  kwhy: hint for Pending pods
  fix/probe-timeout    3 days ago    kwhy: longer probe timeout
  feat/kres-table      2 weeks ago   kres: table output
  docs/readme-install  5 weeks ago   docs: install steps

The three at the bottom are merged already. git prune-merged deletes them.

Names only, for a script

$ git recent -q -n 1
main
$ git switch "$(git recent -q -n 1)"

Pick a branch with fzf

$ git switch "$(git recent -q -a | fzf)"

fzf shows the list and prints the one you pick. It is a separate tool.

See the git command

$ git recent -v -n 2
+ git for-each-ref --sort=-committerdate --count=2 '--format=%(HEAD)%09%(refname:short)%09%(committerdate:relative)%09%(subject)' refs/heads/
  main           2 hours ago  tfcheck: add trivy section
* feat/ctx-warn  5 hours ago  ctx: flag production contexts

Troubleshooting

git-recent: not inside a git repository

Change into a folder of the repository first.

no branches yet, make a first commit

A new repository has no branches until its first commit.

A branch I know I used today is far down the list

git recent sorts by the last commit, not by the last checkout. git reflog shows every checkout, such as git reflog | grep 'checkout:' | head.

The ages look wrong after a rebase

A rebase writes every commit again with a new commit date. That is the date git recent shows.

Exit status

See also

git-prune-merged, git-sync, git-branch(1), git-for-each-ref(1)