While Git Flow (specifically the AVH edition) remains a solid branching model for managing releases and hotfixes in structured production environments, running its full suite of CLI commands daily can feel tedious and error-prone.

Switching branches, stashing uncommitted work, synchronizing develop and main/master, calculating the next Semantic Version (SemVer), drafting tag release notes, and pushing tags across multiple remotes introduce friction that slows down engineering velocity.

To solve this, I built git-flow-shortcuts: a lightweight Zsh plugin that streamlines the entire Git Flow lifecycle with Conventional Commits, automated SemVer bumping, transparent stash/pop handling, and an optional Claude Code skill.

⚡ Key Highlights

• 🔄 Safe Base Branch Sync (gup): Automatically pulls the latest changes for both develop and main/master via --ff-only, while safely stashing and restoring your working directory.
• 🏷️ Automated SemVer Calculation: Determines the next release/hotfix version based on existing Git tags (e.g., 1.4.2 $\rightarrow$ 1.5.0 for releases or 1.5.0 $\rightarrow$ 1.5.1 for hotfixes).
• 💬 Conventional Commits Engine (gcMsg): Enforces structured commits (feat(scope): message) with built-in pull/push sync and breaking change flags (--breaking).
• 📦 Seamless Release & Hotfix Finish: Merges to both target branches without popping up annoying interactive merge editors, creates annotated tags from markdown changelogs, and pushes branches + tags upstream.
• 🤖 AI-Orchestrated via Claude Code: Includes a ready-to-use skill in bonus/skill-claude-code/ so an AI CLI agent can analyze your diffs and orchestrate these commands directly.

🛠️ Installation

You can install it using your preferred Zsh plugin manager or standard shell configuration:

Oh My Zsh

git clone https://github.com/cleversontrujilu/zsh-git-flow-shortcuts \
  "${ZSH_CUSTOM:-$HOME/.oh-my-zsh/custom}/plugins/git-flow-shortcuts"