🚨 Planned Git History Rewrite

[mashehu]

We need to remove a large .cache.tar.xz file from our git history that's bloating the repository. This requires rewriting git history with a force push.

When?

Currently planned for Friday, 21 Nov, 2025 around 12:00 CET.

Who's affected?

Anyone with:

• Local clones of the repository
• Open pull requests
• Branches based on current history

What you need to do

If you have a local clone:

After the file is removed from the git history, run:

git fetch origin
git reset --hard origin/main  # or your branch name

Warning

This will discard all local commits and uncommitted changes. If you have work you want to keep:

• For uncommitted changes: git stash first, then reapply after
• For local commits: Save them with git format-patch origin/main or push to a backup branch first

Alternative approach if you have local commits you want to preserve:

git fetch origin
git rebase origin/main  # Reapply your commits on the new history

If you have open PRs:

Your PR will need to be recreated after the file was from the git history. Please:

1. Save your changes: git format-patch origin/main
2. After the force push, rebase or recreate your PR

Alternative: Fresh clone

If the above seems complicated, you can simply:

# Backup any local work first!
cd ..
mv website website-backup
git clone https://github.com/nf-core/website.git
cd website

Questions?

Ask on the #website channel on Slack.

[mashehu]

Fixed wrong advice in the warning above. committing local changes will not help, stage or format-patch are the only way to keep your progress