how do you revert 1 or more committed files in mercurial but NOT the entire changeset

mercurial

31,129

Solution 1

The exact command you wanted to use would have worked if you used hg revert instead of hg update

hg revert -r .^ File_C
hg commit -m "put C back"

Solution 2

In most cases VonC's solution is just perfect. However, if rollback is no option (e.g. because the commit in question is not the last one or because you did a complex partial commit), then you can do a new commit with the reversed diff of the unwanted changes to File_C:

hg diff -c REVISION --reverse File_C | hg import -m "Revert changes to File_C" -

Where REVISION refers to the commit where File_C has been committed accidentally. The first command produces the reversed diff for the file in question. It's output is piped to hg import (don't forget the trailing -).

UPDATE: You can also use the backout command:

hg backout -I File_C REVISION
hg commit -m "Revert changes of File_C in REVISION" File_C

The backout command changes your working copy in that it undoes the changes to File_C commited in rev. REVISION. Afterwards the revert is committed explicitly.

Solution 3

hg revert FILE -r REVISION

you can revert it to last commit via

hg revert FILE -r .~1

Solution 4

You could use hg rollback to undo your last commit, and then re-do it again, this time without the file C.
(as mentioned in Mercurial FAQ, and also in this FAQ entry where it is noted that "there is no backup when you rollback a transaction", so use it with caution)

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31,129

Author by

gman

FYI: I no longer answer questions on stack overflow If you have a WebGL question you can try asking in the comments on one of the appropriate sites listed below or on the site's corresponding github issues. I was on the Google Chrome GPU team implementing Chrome's GPU subsystem including WebGL and Pepper 3D. I've shipped over 17 commercial games from Atari 800/Apple 2/Commodore 64 days all the way through PS3 and Xbox 360. Some links to things I've worked on: ThreeJSFundamentals,jsgist.org, jsbenchit.org, webgl-lint, games.greggman.com, github, twgl, WebGLFundamentals, WebGL2Fundamentals, vertexshaderart, happyfuntimes, Servez, unzipit, Virtual-WebGL, react-split-it, dekapng, check-all-the-errors @greggman PS: Any code I've posted on Stack Overflow is public domain / CC0. You do not have to credit me.

Updated on September 18, 2020

Comments

gman almost 4 years
Say I have files File_A, File_B and File_C. I edit File_A and File_B on purpose but File_C I just added some debugging code that I don't plan to commit. Then by accident I do a
```
hg commit -m "comment"
```
How do just revert/rollback/backout File_C? Basically I'd be happy to be able to go
```
hg update -r <oneRevBack> File_C
hg commit -m "put C back"
```
but update doesn't take a filter AFAIK so it's also going to revert File_A and File_B. I can copy File_C somewhere, hg update, then copy it back but that seems lame. Is there a way to do this directly in Mercurial?
Ry4an Brase over 13 years

backout automatically commits. You can skip that line as I did in my answer.
Oben Sonne over 13 years

@Ry4an: backout only commits automatically if the revision to backout is the parent of the working dir - here a simple rollback, as suggested by VonC, usually does the job. In other cases (which I refer to in may answer) one needs to commit explicitly. However, thanks for the hint, I'll update my answer to distinguish these backout situations.
Ry4an Brase over 13 years

ah, good to know. I thought it always committed but didn't always merge leaving two heads if the backed out cset wasn't the parent.
Oben Sonne over 13 years

@Ry4an: Yep, it worked like that (leaving 2 heads) before Mercurial 1.7, now the backout command has a slightly (?) different behavior.
surfer01 almost 13 years

Wouldn't this stomp any subsequent commits to the same file?
Zorayr almost 9 years

Example, $ hg revert -r 7428de Libraries/*.
Ian Jones about 7 years

If you want to revert from your last commit (most common case) you can do this so you don't need to look up the rev number: hg revert -r .^ File_C
Matt over 6 years

After the backout how do I get the changes back on the local copy? I accidentally committed and pushed changes to a bunch of files whose changes I didn't want to commit. So I backed out the commit, but how do I get those files back to the modified state they were in before my accidental commit?
Julien Greard over 5 years

wow, thanks ! Very usefull when you want to revert a specific file during a merge !!
kevinji about 5 years

If you use zsh with extendedglob enabled, you'll need to escape the caret: '.^'.