branch-hygiene

name	branch-hygiene
description	Inspect and clean stale branches across multiple repositories using the dotfiles git-hygiene + gh-bootstrap toolchain. Use when the user asks about branch state, stale local branches, or "no ref was fetched" errors.

Branch Hygiene

The user has a three-layer auto-hygiene system in ~/dev/dotfiles/:

What's already automatic

1. GitHub-side settings (set via gh-bootstrap.sh): every repo has delete_branch_on_merge=true, allow_auto_merge=true (Git Pro), allow_update_branch=true, and a squash-only merge policy with squash_merge_commit_title=PR_TITLE / squash_merge_commit_message=PR_BODY.
2. Daily systemd timer (git-hygiene.timer, fires 09:30 local) — runs gh-bootstrap.sh --check --all ~/dev and writes drift state to ~/.local/state/hygiene/status.json. On Sundays it also runs git-hygiene.sh clean ~/dev --yes to delete locally-merged branches.
3. Shell gh wrapper in .bash_aliases — when the user runs gh repo create or gh repo clone from their shell, the wrapper auto-runs gh-bootstrap.sh on the new repo. Note: this only fires from the user's interactive shell, not from agent-spawned shells.

Workflow

When the user asks about hygiene state:

1. Read ~/.local/state/hygiene/status.json first — it's the cached daily check. Use ~/dev/dotfiles/hygiene-status.sh --status for a one-liner or --text for a full readout. This is read-only and instant.
2. If the user wants a fresh check, run ~/dev/dotfiles/gh-bootstrap.sh --check --all ~/dev.
3. To clean stale local branches now (instead of waiting for Sunday): ~/dev/dotfiles/git-hygiene.sh clean ~/dev --yes.
4. To bootstrap a new or drifted repo: ~/dev/dotfiles/gh-bootstrap.sh <owner/repo> or --all <dir>.

Important: agent-created repos

If you (the Codex agent) run gh repo create or gh repo clone yourself, the shell wrapper does not fire — your gh invocation goes directly to the binary. Run ~/dev/dotfiles/gh-bootstrap.sh <owner/repo> immediately after any successful create/clone you do, so the new repo doesn't drift.

What "safely deletable" means here

git-hygiene.sh confirms a local branch is merged via three independent signals before deleting:

1. git cherry origin/<default> <branch> — patch-equivalent commits
2. Each commit's subject is found in origin/<default> history (catches squash collapses that cherry misses)
3. gh pr list --state all --head <branch> returns MERGED

A branch is deleted only when at least one signal confirms merge. Dirty working trees, current branch, and worktree-checked-out branches are always skipped.

Output

If the user just asks "is everything clean?":

$ ~/dev/dotfiles/hygiene-status.sh --status
clean (checked 4h ago)

If drift exists, the same command emits a summary and the user can run gh-bootstrap.sh --all ~/dev to fix it. Be specific about which repos drifted — they're listed in drifted_repos of the JSON.

Project state cleanup

After archiving or deleting a repo locally, also purge its Claude Code state (transcripts, file history, config entries, tasks) — this works from any shell, not just Claude sessions:

# Always dry-run first
claude project purge "$REPO_PATH" --dry-run

# When the dry-run looks right
claude project purge "$REPO_PATH" --yes

The --all flag purges every project not currently on disk in one pass — useful after a quarterly cleanup. Without it, ~/.claude/projects/ and ~/.claude/file-history/ accumulate state for dead projects forever.