This skill should be used when the user asks to "merge a PR", "review and merge pull requests", "integrate external contributions", "handle PR conflicts", "cherry-pick from a PR", or needs to merge GitHub PRs while maximizing contributor attribution.
Merge external pull requests while maximizing original author attribution. Core principle: merge first, resolve conflicts after — never rewrite a contributor's work from scratch.
gh pr merge --squash for clean PRs. For manual merges, use --author="Name <email>".--exclude when a PR contains features already implemented locally. Document what was excluded.git apply + self-commit — this loses author attribution entirely.gh pr list --repo OWNER/REPO --state open \
--json number,title,author,additions,deletions,mergeable
Classify each PR: merge directly, merge with conflict resolution, selective merge, or close.
Prefer gh pr merge — preserves author automatically:
gh pr merge NUMBER --repo OWNER/REPO --squash \
--subject "feat: description (#NUMBER)"
git fetch origin pull/NUMBER/head:pr-NUMBER
git merge pr-NUMBER --no-edit
# Resolve conflicts keeping both sides where possible
git add -A && git commit --no-edit
When a PR contains features already implemented locally:
gh pr diff NUMBER --repo OWNER/REPO | \
git apply --exclude='path/to/skip.py' --exclude='CHANGELOG.md'
git commit --author="Author Name <author@email>" \
-m "feat: description (#NUMBER)
Cherry-picked from PR #NUMBER. Excluded: file.py (already implemented)."
gh pr close NUMBER --repo OWNER/REPO \
--comment "Fixed via PR #OTHER. Thank you for the contribution!"
python -m ruff check src/ tests/ # lint
python -m pytest tests/ -q # unit tests
git push origin main # push
Then run harness-eval for end-to-end verification on an unfamiliar codebase.
Before pushing a merged PR:
git log (via --author or GitHub squash merge)#NUMBER)git apply + self-commit loses authorreferences/merge-scenarios.md — Detailed examples for each merge scenario (clean, conflicting, selective, duplicate)