
How you tried to automate any daily tasks of your programming? You should!

A git workflow I do every day is code something, stash it, checkout latest master, create a new branch, push my new code and create a mr/pr for it. This gets tedious over time given I usually do it 5+ times a day. [Git aliases](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Git-Aliases) to the rescue!

My workplace uses gitlab and they support [push options](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/project/push_options.html), one of which is creating a Merge Request (Pull Request equivalent for GitHub). Thanks to this you can easily create a Gitlab merge request using the CLI. Let me present you the alias `git newmr`, allowing you to do all of the above things with one command!

```bash
git config --global alias.newmr "!f() { git stash save && git checkout master && git pull && git checkout -b $1 && git stash apply && git add . && git commit -m $1 && git push -u origin HEAD -o merge_request.create; }; f"
```

I can trigger the command with `git newmr <branchname>` and it:

1. Stashes the current changes
2. Checks out and pulls the latest master branch
3. Creates a new branch based on `<branchname>`
4. Applies the stash
5. Commits changes
6. Pushes the new branch as a remote
7. Creates a PR/MR

At my workplace we use [Jira](https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira) for issue tracking, and by setting the branch name to the issue number the issue will automatically close on jira when the branch is merged. Example: `git newmr TL-1337`.

## Creating your own

Creating a custom [git alias](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Basics-Git-Aliases) is super easy. Looking at the example on the linked page adding a “unstage” alias is as easy as:

```bash
git config --global alias.unstage 'reset HEAD --'
```

In our case we want do do a lot of different things and pass parameters and that's were basic git aliases start to limit us. Luckily there is a solution to this!

## Escaping to the shell

We can access the shell by using the ! (bang). We can now have a lot more possibility including multiple commands and passing parameters. Let's add the commands we're looking for based on the list above. $1 means the first parameter we pass, so let's add it as our branch name and commit message. The -o option in our git push is gitlabs push option, in this case we’re using it to create a merge request.

```bash
git config --global alias.newmr "!f() { git stash save && git checkout master && git pull && git checkout -b $1 && git stash apply && git add . && git commit -m $1 && git push -u origin HEAD -o merge_request.create; }; f"
```

After running the command above you can use it with `git newmr <branch_name>` ✌️✨

## Adopting it for GitHub

If you are using GitHub you can can use [their cli](https://cli.github.com/manual/gh_pr_create) instead of push options for creating the pull request with `gh pr create`.

First install the GitHub cli with brew

```bash
brew install gh
```

Then add our alias, note that I've  renamed it to `git newpr` to separate it from the gitlab version.

```bash
git config --global alias.newpr "!f() { git stash save && git checkout master && git pull && git checkout -b $1 && git stash apply && git add . && git commit -m $1 && git push -u origin HEAD && gh pr create; }; f"
```

## Editing you aliases or troubleshooting

All your aliases are stored in the global git config located in `~home/<username>/.gitconfig`. My complete file now looks like this:

```bash
[user]
  name = Kuan-Yin Chen
  email = samuelkraft@me.com
[alias]
  newmr = "!f() { git stash save && git checkout master && git pull && git checkout -b $1 && git stash apply && git add . && git commit -m $1 && git push -u origin HEAD -o merge_request.create; }; f"
  newpr = "!f() { git stash save && git checkout master && git pull && git checkout -b $1 && git stash apply && git add . && git commit -m $1 && git push -u origin HEAD && gh pr create; }; f"
```

Do you have any other tips for custom aliases? Let me know on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/samuelkraft)!


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