Conventional Commits & Branch Naming

Follow Conventional Commits v1.0.0 for both branch names and commit messages — consistent naming lets tools auto-generate changelogs, enforce SemVer bumps, and filter history by concern.

Branch Naming

Format: <type>/[issue-]<description> — lowercase, hyphens only, no special chars except /.

feat/user-authentication
feat/42-user-authentication
fix/login-race-condition
fix/87-login-race-condition
docs/api-reference-update
refactor/payment-module

Prefix with the issue number when one exists — GitHub and GitLab auto-link it and it makes git log immediately traceable to the tracker. Keep the description under 50 characters — most git UIs truncate branch names in lists around that length. Match the type to the work you're doing — this is the contract readers use to understand the branch purpose at a glance.

NEVER include worktree in a branch name — git worktrees are a local checkout mechanism, not a branch concept; the name would leak implementation details into the remote and confuse other contributors.

Worktree Naming

Worktrees are local checkout directories — they never appear in the remote. Place them under .claude/worktrees/ and name them by replacing the branch / separator with -.

git worktree add .claude/worktrees/feat-user-authentication feat/user-authentication
git worktree add .claude/worktrees/fix-87-login-race-condition fix/87-login-race-condition

The directory name mirrors the branch name so git worktree list stays readable and each worktree is immediately traceable to its branch without inspecting the checkout. Run git worktree list before creating a new one — reuse an existing worktree if it already covers the same branch.

Keep worktrees scoped to a single branch. Doing unrelated work inside someone else's worktree obscures which changes belong where and makes cleanup error-prone.

Remove the worktree once its branch is merged — either after a local merge or after the pull/merge request is closed on the remote. Stale worktrees accumulate and make git worktree list unreadable.

git worktree remove .claude/worktrees/feat-user-authentication   # branch merged locally
git worktree prune                                                # remove refs to already-deleted directories

Commit Message Format

<type>[optional scope]: <description>
[optional body]
[optional footer(s)]

Types:

Rules:

• Subject line ≤ 72 characters — git log and GitHub/GitLab UIs silently truncate longer subjects
• Imperative mood: "add" not "added" — reads as an instruction, not a history log
• No capital letter, no trailing period — enforces uniform parsing by changelog tools
• Body separated by blank line — parsers split header/body at the first blank line
• Breaking changes: use ! after type/scope, or add BREAKING CHANGE: footer (triggers MAJOR bump) — body-only descriptions are invisible to changelog tools
• revert commits SHOULD include This reverts commit <hash>. in the body — git revert generates this automatically; don't strip it
• NEVER add a Claude signature, AI agent attribution, or Co-authored-by trailer for Claude or any other AI agent to commits

Examples:

feat(auth): add JWT token refresh

fix: prevent race condition on concurrent requests

Introduce request ID and reference to latest request.
Dismiss responses from stale requests.

refactor!: drop support for Go 1.18

BREAKING CHANGE: Go 1.18 no longer supported; uses stdlib APIs from 1.21+

Closing Issues via Commit Messages

Both GitHub and GitLab detect keywords in commit messages and automatically close the referenced issue when the commit lands on the default branch. Place the reference in the footer (preferred — keeps the subject line clean).

Keywords: close, closes, closed, fix, fixes, fixed, resolve, resolves, resolved — case-insensitive.

GitHub:

fix(auth): prevent token expiry race condition

Closes #42
Closes owner/repo#99

• Triggers when merged into the default branch (usually main)
• Cross-repo: Closes owner/repo#42
• Close multiple: Closes #42, closes #43
• Works in PR descriptions too

GitLab:

feat: add dark mode support

Resolves #101
Closes group/project#42

• Triggers when merged into the default branch (configurable per project)
• Cross-project: Closes group/project#42
• Close multiple: Closes #101, closes #102
• Works in MR descriptions too

Tip: Pair with the commit type — fix: closing a bug issue, feat: closing a feature request — keeps the changelog semantically coherent.

Common Mistakes

Best Practices

• Align branch type and commit type — feat/auth-* branch → feat(auth): commits
• One concern per branch — mixing fixes into feature branches obscures the changelog
• Use scope consistently within a branch — feat(auth): throughout, not feat(user): mid-way
• Squash merge: when squash-merging a PR/MR, the branch commits are collapsed into one — the PR/MR title becomes the commit message. If the title doesn't follow conventional commits format, changelog generation breaks silently. Always set the PR title before squashing.