Unfortunately, GitHub pull requests encourage explicit merge commits for every pull request.<p>This is not helpful and can be quite annoying - especially for pull requests that contain just a single commit. Those merge commits are introduced even if the<p>Maybe there should be a GitHub feature that pull requests are automatically rebased (as long as possible safely and automatically). Or, that the GUI allows a pull reqeust to be &quot;fast-forwarded&quot; instead of &quot;merged&quot;, if possible.