Git: beyond the basics

Commit message best practices

Explain what, then why, but not how.
Use a short descriptive subject.
Write in present tense, imperative voice.
Put additional details in the body.

Formatting

Start subjects with a capital, but do not end with a period.
Keep subjects roughly less than 50 characters.
Separate the subject and body with a blank line.
Wrap the body to roughly 72 characters.

Answer the question:

If applied, this commit will...

Good

Query transactions for a set of addresses
Include stack trace with error messages
Refactor subsystem X for readability
Update getting started documentation
Remove deprecated methods
Release version 1.0.0

Bad

Fixed the bug with the server
Forgot to include this.
Updating the API.
Improvements.

Read https://chris.beams.io/posts/git-commit/ for more.