Nuke git history

If you add a .env or some other password to git by mistake, you’ll want to remove it.

Remove current version

Remove the file from the index (the repo), but keep it on your computer (.env in this example)

git rm --cached .env

Commit the change

git commit -m "Remove sensitive config from source control"

Push to your remote (GitHub/GitLab/etc)

git push origin main

Clean git history

The above only removes the file going forward. If you want to remove it from the git history, you’ll need to use git-filter-repo.

Install git-filter-repo

Debian based distros

sudo apt install git-filter-repo

Arch based distros

sudo pacman -S git-filter-repo

Fedora based distros

sudo dnf install git-filter-repo

Cleanup

Wipe

git filter-repo --path .env --invert-paths

Relink

git remote add origin <your-repo-url>

Push

git push origin --force --all