Checkout Latest Commit Before a given Date/Deadline

If you need to checkout the latest commit before a given date or deadline in a git repository:

First, save the desired deadline (yymmddhhmm) an environment variable:

export DEADLINE="2111081100" #yymmddhhmm

Second, run this command to checkout the lates commit before the defined deadline:

git checkout "$(git log --date=format-local:'%y%m%d%H%M' --format="%ad %h %d %s" | \
awk -v deadline="$DEADLINE" '$1<deadline' | head -n1 | awk '{ print $2}')"

References Consulted:

• https://stackoverflow.com/questions/53153171/git-log-custom-format-equivalent-to-git-log-oneline