nvim-tinygit

Bundle of commands focused on swift and streamlined git operations.

Breaking changes in v1.0

• dressing.nvim and nvim-notify are no longer dependencies.
• telescope.nvim is now a required dependency.
• The commit.insertIssuesOnHashSign feature has been removed. Better issue insertion via plugins like cmp-git or blink-cmp-git now work there.
• smartCommit was overhauled. Among other improvements, it now supports a commit body.

[!NOTE] If you want to keep using the previous version, without these breaking changes, you can pin the tag v0.9:

-- lazy.nvim
{
    "chrisgrieser/nvim-tinygit",
    tag = "v0.9"
    dependencies = "stevearc/dressing.nvim",
},

Feature overview

• Interactive staging of hunks (parts of a file). Displays hunk diffs with syntax highlighting, and allows resetting or navigating to the hunk.
• Smart-commit: Open a popup to enter a commit message with syntax highlighting, commit preview, and commit title length indicators. If there are no staged changes, stages all changes before doing so (git add -A). Optionally trigger a git push afterward.
• Convenient commands for amend, stash, fixup, or undoing commits.
• Search issues & PRs. Open the selected issue or PR in the browser.
• Open the GitHub URL of the current file, repo, or selected lines. Also supports opening GitHub's blame view.
• Explore file history: Search the git history of a file for a string ("git pickaxe"), or examine the history of a function or line range. Displays the results in a diff view with syntax highlighting, correctly following file renamings.
• Status line components: git blame of a file and branch state.
• Streamlined workflow: operations are smartly combined to minimize friction. For instance, the smart-commit command combines staging, committing, and pushing, and searching the file history combines unshallowing, searching, and diff navigation.

Table of contents

• Installation
• Configuration
• Commands
  • Interactive staging
  • Smart commit
  • Amend and fixup commits
  • Undo last commit/amend
  • GitHub interaction
  • Push & PRs
  • File history
  • Stash
• Status line components
  • git blame
  • Branch state
• Credits

Installation

Requirements

• nvim 0.10+
• telescope.nvim
• curl for GitHub-related features
• optional: Treesitter parser for syntax highlighting: TSInstall gitcommit

-- lazy.nvim (automatically takes care of dependencies)
{ "chrisgrieser/nvim-tinygit" },

-- packer
use {
    "chrisgrieser/nvim-tinygit",
    requires = "nvim-telescope/telescope.nvim",
}

Configuration

The setup call is optional.

-- default config
require("tinygit").setup {
    stage = { -- requires `telescope.nvim`
        contextSize = 1, -- larger values "merge" hunks. 0 is not supported.
        stagedIndicator = "󰐖",
        keymaps = { -- insert & normal mode
            stagingToggle = "<Space>", -- stage/unstage hunk
            gotoHunk = "<CR>",
            resetHunk = "<C-r>",
        },
        moveToNextHunkOnStagingToggle = false,

        -- accepts the common telescope picker config
        telescopeOpts = { 
            layout_strategy = "horizontal",
            layout_config = {
                horizontal = {
                    preview_width = 0.65,
                    height = { 0.7, min = 20 },
                },
            },
        },
    },
    commit = {
        keepAbortedMsgSecs = 300,
        border = "single",
        spellcheck = false, -- vim's builtin spellcheck
        wrap = "hard", ---@type "hard"|"soft"|"none"
        keymaps = {
            normal = { abort = "q", confirm = "<CR>" },
            insert = { confirm = "<C-CR>" },
        },
        subject = {
            -- automatically apply formatting to the subject line
            autoFormat = function(subject) ---@type nil|fun(subject: string): string
                subject = subject:gsub("%.$", "") -- remove trailing dot https://commitlint.js.org/reference/rules.html#body-full-stop
                return subject
            end,

            -- disallow commits that do not use an allowed type
            enforceType = false,
            -- stylua: ignore
            types = {
                "fix", "feat", "chore", "docs", "refactor", "build", "test",
                "perf", "style", "revert", "ci", "break",
            },
        },
        body = {
            enforce = false,
        },
    },
    push = {
        preventPushingFixupCommits = true,
        confirmationSound = true, -- currently macOS only, PRs welcome

        -- If pushed commits contain references to issues, open them in the browser
        -- (not used when using force-push).
        openReferencedIssues = false,
    },
    github = {
        icons = {
            openIssue = "🟢",
            closedIssue = "🟣",
            notPlannedIssue = "⚪",
            openPR = "🟩",
            mergedPR = "🟪",
            draftPR = "⬜",
            closedPR = "🟥",
        },
    },
    history = {
        diffPopup = {
            width = 0.8, -- between 0-1
            height = 0.8,
            border = "single",
        },
        autoUnshallowIfNeeded = false,
    },
    appearance = {
        mainIcon = "󰊢",
        backdrop = {
            enabled = true,
            blend = 40, -- 0-100
        },
    },
    statusline = {
        blame = {
            ignoreAuthors = {}, -- hide component if from these authors (useful for bots)
            hideAuthorNames = {}, -- show component, but hide names (useful for your own name)
            maxMsgLen = 40,
            icon = "ﰖ",
        },
        branchState = {
            icons = {
                ahead = "󰶣",
                behind = "󰶡",
                diverge = "󰃻",
            },
        },
    },
}

Commands

All commands are available via lua function or sub-command of :Tinygit, for example require("tinygit").interactiveStaging() and :Tinygit interactiveStaging. However, do note that the lua function is preferable, since the :Tinygit does not accept command-specific options and does not trigger visual-mode specific changes to the commands.

Interactive staging

• This command stages hunks, that is, parts of a file instead of the full file. It is roughly comparable to git add -p.
• Use <Space> to (un)stage the hunk, <CR> to go to the hunk, or <C-r to reset the hunk (mappings customizable). Your regular telescope mappings also apply.
• The size of the hunks is determined by the setting staging.contextSize. Larger context size is going to "merge" changes that are close to one another into one hunk. (As such, the hunks displayed are not 1:1 the same as the hunks from gitsigns.nvim.) A context size between 1 and 4 is recommended.
• Limitations: contextSize=0 (= no merging at all) is not supported.

require("tinygit").interactiveStaging()

Smart commit

• Open a commit popup, alongside a preview of what is going to be committed. If there are no staged changes, stage all changes (git add --all) before the commit. Optionally run git push if the repo is clean after committing.
• The window title of the input field displays what actions are going to be performed. You can see at glance whether all changes are going to be committed, or whether there a git push is triggered afterward, so there are no surprises.
• Input field contents of aborted commits are briefly kept, if you just want to fix a detail.
• The first line is used as commit subject, the rest is as commit body.

-- values shown are the defaults
require("tinygit").smartCommit { pushIfClean = false, pullBeforePush = true }

Example workflow
Assuming these keybindings:

vim.keymap.set("n", "<leader>ga", function() require("tinygit").interactiveStaging() end, { desc = "git add" })
vim.keymap.set("n", "<leader>gc", function() require("tinygit").smartCommit() end, { desc = "git commit" })
vim.keymap.set("n", "<leader>gp", function() require("tinygit").push() end, { desc = "git push" })

1. Stage some changes via <leader>ga.
2. Use <leader>gc to enter a commit message.
3. Repeat 1 and 2.
4. When done, <leader>gp to push the commits.

Using pushIfClean = true allows you to combine staging, committing, and pushing into a single step, when it is the last commit you intend to make.

Amend and fixup commits

Amending

• amendOnlyMsg just opens the commit popup to change the last commit message, and does not stage any changes.
• amendNoEdit keeps the last commit message; if there are no staged changes, stages all changes (git add --all), like smartCommit.
• Optionally runs git push --force-with-lease afterward, if the branch has diverged (that is, the amended commit was already pushed).

-- values shown are the defaults
require("tinygit").amendOnlyMsg { forcePushIfDiverged = false }
require("tinygit").amendNoEdit { forcePushIfDiverged = false, stageAllIfNothingStaged = true }

Fixup commits

• fixupCommit lets you select a commit from the last X commits and runs git commit --fixup on the selected commit.
• If there are no staged changes, stages all changes (git add --all), like smartCommit.
• autoRebase = true automatically runs rebase with --autosquash and --autostash afterward, confirming all fixups and squashes without opening a rebase to do editor. Note that this can potentially result in conflicts.

-- values shown are the defaults
require("tinygit").fixupCommit {
    selectFromLastXCommits = 15,
    autoRebase = false,
}

Undo last commit/amend

require("tinygit").undoLastCommitOrAmend()

• Changes in the working directory are kept, but unstaged. (In the background, this uses git reset --mixed.)
• If there was a push operation done as a followup (such as .smartCommit { pushIfClean = false }), the last commit is not undone.

GitHub interaction

Search issues & PRs

• Requires curl.

-- state: all|closed|open (default: all)
-- type: all|issue|pr (default: all)
require("tinygit").issuesAndPrs { type = "all", state = "all" }

-- alternative: if the word under the cursor is of the form `#123`,
-- open that issue/PR
require("tinygit").openIssueUnderCursor()

GitHub URL
Creates a permalink to the current file/lines at GitHub. The link is opened in the browser and copied to the system clipboard. In normal mode, uses the current file, in visual mode, uses the selected lines. (Note that visual mode detection requires you to use the lua function below instead of the :Tinygit ex-command.)

• "file": code view
• "blame": blame view
• "repo": repo root

-- file|repo|blame (default: file)
require("tinygit").githubUrl("file")

Push & PRs

• push can be combined with other actions, depending on the options.
• createGitHubPr opens a PR from the current branch browser. (This requires the repo to be a fork with sufficient information on the remote.)

-- values shown are the defaults
require("tinygit").push {
    pullBefore = false,
    forceWithLease = false,
    createGitHubPr = false,
}
require("tinygit").createGitHubPr()

File history

Search the git history of the current file. Select from the matching commits to open a popup with a diffview of the changes.

If the config history.autoUnshallowIfNeeded is set to true, will also automatically un-shallow the repo if needed.

require("tinygit").fileHistory()

The type of history search depends on the mode .fileHistory is called from:

• Normal mode: search file history for a string (git log -G)
  • Correctly follows file renamings, and displays past filenames in the commit selection.
  • The search input is case-insensitive and supports regex.
  • Leave the input field empty to display all commits that changed the current file.
• Visual mode: function history (git log -L).
  • The selected text is assumed to be the name of the function whose history you want to explore.
  • Note that git uses heuristics to determine the enclosing function of a change, so this is not 100% perfect and has varying reliability across languages.
  • Caveat: for function history, git does not support to follow renamings of the file or function name.
• Visual line mode: line range history (git log -L).
  • Uses the selected lines as the line range.
  • Caveat: for line history, git does not support to follow file renamings.

Note that visual mode detection requires you to use the lua function above instead of the :Tinygit ex-command.

Stash

Simple wrappers around git stash push and git stash pop.

require("tinygit").stashPush()
require("tinygit").stashPop()

Status line components

git blame

Shows the message and date (git blame) of the last commit that changed the current file (not line).

require("tinygit.statusline").blame()

[!TIP] Some status line plugins also allow you to put components into the tab line or win bar. If your status line is too crowded, you can add the blame-component to one of those bars instead.

The component can be configured with the statusline.blame options in the plugin configuration.

Branch state

Shows whether the local branch is ahead or behind of its remote counterpart. (Note that this component does not run git fetch for performance reasons, so the component may not be up-to-date with remote changes.)

require("tinygit.statusline").branchState()

Credits

In my day job, I am a sociologist studying the social mechanisms underlying the digital economy. For my PhD project, I investigate the governance of the app economy and how software ecosystems manage the tension between innovation and compatibility. If you are interested in this subject, feel free to get in touch.

I also occasionally blog about vim: Nano Tips for Vim

• Website
• Mastodon
• ResearchGate
• LinkedIn