BRANCH CLEANUP

Mobius Branch Cleanup Tools¶

EPICON-compliant branch management — intent before deletion.

Quick Start¶

One-liner: Delete all merged branches¶

# Preview what would be deleted
./scripts/quick-cleanup.sh --dry-run

# Actually delete
./scripts/quick-cleanup.sh

Interactive: Full branch management¶

./scripts/cleanup-branches.sh

Philosophy¶

These scripts embody the EPICON principle: no consequential action without explicit, recorded intent.

Every deletion: 1. Declares intent (what, why) 2. Requires confirmation 3. Logs the action with timestamp and operator

Scripts¶

quick-cleanup.sh¶

Fast cleanup of merged branches. Use when you just want to clear out branches that have been merged to main.

Features: - Fetches and prunes automatically - Shows what will be deleted before acting - Supports --dry-run flag - Logs EPICON intent - Protects canonical branches (main, claude/atlas, cursor/aurea)

cleanup-branches.sh¶

Interactive branch management with full analysis.

Features: - Analyze: View all branches with status (merged/stale/active) - Delete merged: Bulk delete branches merged to main - Review stale: Interactive review of branches >30 days old - Dry run mode: Preview without actual deletions - Full logging: Every action logged with EPICON intent

Branch Categories¶

Usage Examples¶

Analyze Current Branches¶

$ ./scripts/cleanup-branches.sh
# Select option 1

STATUS   BRANCH                                             AGE   LAST COMMIT
──────── ────────────────────────────────────────────────── ──── ──────────────
🔒 protected main                                            0d   chore: update deps
🔒 protected claude/atlas                                    1d   feat: add new feature
🔒 protected cursor/aurea                                    2d   fix: resolve bug
✅ merged   cursor/old-feature-abc1                         15d   feat: completed feature
⚠️ stale    claude/abandoned-work-xyz2                       45d   wip: incomplete
🔵 active   cursor/current-work-def3                          3d   feat: in progress

Delete Merged Branches¶

$ ./scripts/quick-cleanup.sh
🌀 Mobius Quick Branch Cleanup
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Merged branches to delete (3):
  - cursor/old-feature-abc1
  - claude/completed-fix-ghi4
  - cursor/another-merged-jkl5

Delete these branches? [y/N]: y

📋 EPICON Intent: delete_merged_branches
   Scope: 3 branches
   Rationale: Removing branches merged to main
   Timestamp: 2026-01-16T22:00:00Z

Deleting cursor/old-feature-abc1... ✅
Deleting claude/completed-fix-ghi4... ✅
Deleting cursor/another-merged-jkl5... ✅

✅ Cleanup complete.

Log Format¶

All actions are logged to branch_cleanup_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS.log:

=== EPICON INTENT ===
action: delete_branches
scope: 3 merged branches
rationale: Removing branches merged to main
timestamp: 2026-01-16T22:00:00Z
operator: Michael Judan <michaeljjudan@gmail.com>

  ✅ Deleted cursor/old-feature-abc1
  ✅ Deleted claude/completed-fix-ghi4
  ✅ Deleted cursor/another-merged-jkl5

GitHub Settings Recommendation¶

Enable auto-delete for merged PR branches:

1. Go to repo Settings → General
2. Find "Pull Requests" section
3. Check "Automatically delete head branches"

This prevents branch accumulation from merged PRs.

Environment Variables¶

Example:

DRY_RUN=false ./scripts/cleanup-branches.sh

CI Integration¶

For automated cleanup in CI (use with caution):

# .github/workflows/branch-cleanup.yml
name: Branch Cleanup
on:
  schedule:
    - cron: '0 0 * * 0'  # Weekly on Sunday

jobs:
  cleanup:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0

      - name: Delete merged branches
        run: |
          git fetch --prune origin
          PROTECTED="main\|master\|develop\|HEAD\|claude/atlas\|cursor/aurea"
          for branch in $(git branch -r --merged origin/main | grep -v "$PROTECTED"); do
            branch_name=${branch#origin/}
            echo "Deleting $branch_name"
            git push origin --delete "$branch_name" || true
          done
        env:
          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}

Troubleshooting¶

Permission Denied¶

error: unable to delete 'branch-name': remote ref does not exist

The branch may have already been deleted or you lack push permissions.

Protected Branch¶

remote: error: refusing to delete the current branch

You cannot delete a branch you're currently on. Switch to main first.

Branch Has Open PR¶

Before deleting, check if a branch has an open PR:

gh pr list --head "branch-name" --state open

Related Documents¶

• Branch Strategy
• GI Gate Workflow

"Memory with teeth — even for branch management."

Cycle: C-198 Last Updated: 2026-01-16