Find a needle in a haystack with Git bisect
The article explains how git bisect efficiently identifies regression bugs by narrowing down commits. The author found the problematic commit after testing 11 out of 2,088, saving time in debugging.
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The article discusses the use of the git bisect tool to identify the source of a regression bug in a software project. The author, Jerry Orr, outlines the steps taken to locate the problematic commit after a bug was reported on October 21, 2024. The process begins by identifying a "good" commit from the release-5.7.0 branch, which was created two months prior, and a "bad" commit from the main branch where the bug was present. This narrowed down the search to 2,088 commits. Using git bisect, Orr performs a binary search between the good and bad commits, testing each one to determine if the bug is present. After testing 11 commits, he successfully identifies the first bad commit, which introduced the bug about a month earlier. The article highlights the efficiency of git bisect in streamlining the debugging process, saving significant time compared to manually reviewing each commit.
- Git bisect is an effective tool for identifying regression bugs in software.
- The process involves defining "good" and "bad" commits to narrow down the search.
- A binary search method is used to efficiently locate the problematic commit.
- The author successfully identified the bug after testing only 11 commits out of 2,088.
- Git bisect significantly reduces the time spent on debugging compared to manual methods.
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3 commentsJust a few easy steps between "I can test for this bug and don't know where it is in hundreds of thousands of lines" and "Here's the three line change that created the bug and context about them".
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