git rebase fixup after push is rejected

Question

I have pushed a feature branch to github that I realized I want to rebase in order to squash some commits. I run

git rebase HEAD~5

on my local branch and set all but the first and last commit to "fixup". I save and quit and the rebase continues fine. When I try to push I get

 error: failed to push some refs to 'git@github.com:username/repo.git'
 hint: Updates were rejected because the tip of your current branch is behind
 hint: its remote counterpart. Integrate the remote changes (e.g.
 hint: 'git pull ...') before pushing again.

Is there a way to do this without push -f or is that my only recourse? Is there a better way to squash the commits?

Answer 1

The only way is with git push -f . The commits you removed (by replacing them with a single squashed one) are already on the remote. Without -f , you can only add commits, not remove/replace them.

On the other hand, if nobody has pull ed yet, it shouldn't be a problem.