Commit Work

Commit work

Goal

Make commits that are easy to review and safe to ship:

• only intended changes are included
• commits are logically scoped (split when needed)
• commit messages describe what changed and why

Inputs to ask for (if missing)

• Single commit or multiple commits? (If unsure: default to multiple small commits when there are unrelated changes.)
• Commit style: Conventional Commits are required.
• Any rules: max subject length, required scopes.

Workflow (checklist)

1) Inspect the working tree before staging

• git status
• git diff (unstaged)
• If many changes: git diff --stat

2) Decide commit boundaries (split if needed)

• Split by: feature vs refactor, backend vs frontend, formatting vs logic, tests vs prod code, dependency bumps vs behavior changes.
• If changes are mixed in one file, plan to use patch staging.

3) Stage only what belongs in the next commit

• Prefer patch staging for mixed changes: git add -p
• To unstage a hunk/file: git restore --staged -p or git restore --staged <path>

4) Review what will actually be committed

• git diff --cached
• Sanity checks:
• no secrets or tokens
• no accidental debug logging
• no unrelated formatting churn

5) Describe the staged change in 1-2 sentences (before writing the message)

• "What changed?" + "Why?"
• If you cannot describe it cleanly, the commit is probably too big or mixed; go back to step 2.

6) Write the commit message

• Use Conventional Commits (required):
• type(scope): short summary
• blank line
• body (what/why, not implementation diary)
• footer (BREAKING CHANGE) if needed
• Prefer an editor for multi-line messages: git commit -v
• Use references/commit-message-template.md if helpful.

7) Run the smallest relevant verification

• Run the repo's fastest meaningful check (unit tests, lint, or build) before moving on.

8) Repeat for the next commit until the working tree is clean

Deliverable

Provide:

• the final commit message(s)
• a short summary per commit (what/why)
• the commands used to stage/review (at minimum: git diff --cached, plus any tests run)