Version Control With Git: Local Operations
Example: A Slide Deck for a Presentation
Imagine you have two computers: the first is a big, powerful desktop machine with a big, dual monitor setup. The second is a tiny lightweight netbook you take with you when you travel. Imagine also that you have a presentation at a conference overseas. You know that no matter how "finished" you think you are with your slide deck, inevitably you will realize you need to add an exta figure or recalculate some data AFTER leaving the country and your main desktop workstation. How can you be sure your slide deck, data, and the programs you've written are synchronized between your two machines? How can you be sure that every little change you've made on your netbook is reflected on your desktop? What happens if you start making changes on your slide deck, only to realize you need to drop back to the slide deck you had five days ago?
git : What is Version Control ?
Very briefly, version control is a way to keep a backup of changing files, to store a history of those changes, and most importantly to allow many people in a collaboration to make changes to the same files concurrently. There are a lot of verson control systems. Wikipedia provides both a nice vocabulary list and a fairly complete table of some popular version control systems and their equivalent commands.
Today, we'll be using git. Git is an example of a distributed version control system, distinct from centralized verson control systems. I'll make the distinction clear later, but for now, the table below will suffice.
Version Control System Tool Options
- Distributed
- Decentralized CVS (dcvs)
- mercurial (hg)
- git (git)
- bazaar (bzr)
- Decentralized CVS (dcvs)
- Centralized
- concurrent versions system (cvs)
- subversion (svn)
git --help : Getting Help
The first thing I like to know about any tool is how to get help. From the command line type
$ man git
The manual entry for the git version control system will appear before you. You may scroll through it using arrows, or you can search for keywords by typing / followed by the search term. I'm interested in help, so I type /help and then hit enter. It looks like the syntax for getting help with git is git --help.
To exit the manual page, type q.
Let's see what happens when we type :
$ git --help
Excellent, it gives a list of commands it is able to help with, as well as their descriptions.
$ git --help
usage: git [--version] [--exec-path[=<path>]] [--html-path]
[-p|--paginate|--no-pager] [--no-replace-objects]
[--bare] [--git-dir=<path>] [--work-tree=<path>]
[-c name=value] [--help]
<command> [<args>]
The most commonly used git commands are:
add Add file contents to the index
bisect Find by binary search the change that introduced a bug
branch List, create, or delete branches
checkout Checkout a branch or paths to the working tree
clone Clone a repository into a new directory
commit Record changes to the repository
diff Show changes between commits, commit and working tree, etc
fetch Download objects and refs from another repository
grep Print lines matching a pattern
init Create an empty git repository or reinitialize an existing one
log Show commit logs
merge Join two or more development histories together
mv Move or rename a file, a directory, or a symlink
pull Fetch from and merge with another repository or a local branch
push Update remote refs along with associated objects
rebase Forward-port local commits to the updated upstream head
reset Reset current HEAD to the specified state
rm Remove files from the working tree and from the index
show Show various types of objects
status Show the working tree status
tag Create, list, delete or verify a tag object signed with GPG
See 'git help <command>' for more information on a specific command.
git config : Controls the behavior of git
$ git config --global user.name "YOUR NAME"
$ git config --global user.email "YOUR EMAIL"
git init : Creating a Local Repository
To keep track of numerous versions of your work without saving numerous copies, you can make a local repository for it on your computer. What git does is to save the first version, then for each subsequent version it saves only the changes. That is, git only records the difference between the new version and the one before it. With this compact information, git is able to recreate any version on demand by adding the changes to the original in order up to the version of interest.
To create your own local (on your own machine) repository, you must initialize the repository with the infrastructure git needs in order to keep a record of things within the repsitory that you're concerned about. The command to do this is git init .
Exercise : Create a Local Repository
Step 1 : Initialize your repository.
$ cd
$ mkdir good_science
$ cd good_science
$ git init
Initialized empty Git repository in /Users/swc/good_science/.git/
Step 2 : Browse the directory's hidden files to see what happened here. Open directories, browse file contents. Learn what you can in a minute.
$ ls -A
.git
$ cd .git
$ ls -A
HEAD config description hooks info objects refs
Step 3 : Use what you've learned. You may have noticed the file called description. You can describe your repository by opening the description file and replacing the text with a name for the repository. Mine will be called "Reproducible Science". You may call yours anything you like.
$ kate description &
Step 4 : Applications sometimes create files that are not needed. For example, kate creates a temporary file called 'filename~' when you edit the file 'filename'. You can ask git to ignore such files by editing the file '.git/info/exclude'. Edit the file to ignore files the end with '~'.
git ls-files --others --exclude-from=.git/info/exclude
# Lines that start with '#' are comments.
# For a project mostly in C, the following would be a good set of
# exclude patterns (uncomment them if you want to use them):
# *.[oa]
# *~
git add : Adding a File To Version Control
For the git repository to know which files within this directory you would like to keep track of, you must add them. First, you'll need to create one, then we'll learn the git add command.
Exercise : Add a File to Your Local Repository
Step 1 : Create a file to add to your repository.
$ kate readme.rst &
Step 2 : Inform git that you would like to keep track of future changes in this file.
$ git add readme.rst
git status : Checking the Status of Your Local Copy
The files you've created on your machine are your local "working" copy. The changes your make in this local copy aren't backed up online automatically. Until you commit them, the changes you make are local changes. When you change anything, your set of files becomes different from the files in the official repository copy. To find out what's different about them in the terminal, try:
$ git status
# On branch master
#
# Initial commit
#
# Changes to be committed:
# (use "git rm --cached <file>..." to unstage)
#
# new file: readme.rst
#
The null result means that you're up to date with the current version of the repository online. This result indicates that the current difference between the repository HEAD (which, so far, is empty) and your good_science directory is this new readme.rst file.
git commit : Saving a Snapshot
In order to save a snapshot of the current state (revision) of the repository, we use the commit command. This command is always associated with a message describing the changes since the last commit and indicating their purpose. Informative commit messages will serve you well someday, so make a habit of never committing changes without at least a full sentence description.
ADVICE: Commit often
In the same way that it is wise to often save a document that you are working on, so too is it wise to save numerous revisions of your code. More frequent commits increase the granularity of your undo button.
ADVICE: Write good commit messages
There are no hard and fast rules, but good commits are atomic: they are the smallest change that remain meaningful. A good commit message usually contains a one-line description followed by a longer explanation if necessary.
Our repo has some good commit messages.
Exercise : Commit Your Changes
Step 1 : Commit the file you've added to your repository.
$ git commit -am "This is the first commit. It adds a readme file."
[master (root-commit) 1863aef] This is the first commit. It adds a readme file.
1 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 readme.rst
Step 2 : Admire your work.
$ git status
# On branch master
nothing to commit (working directory clean)
git diff : Viewing the Differences
There are many diff tools.
If you have a favorite you can set your default git diff tool to execute that one. Git, however, comes with its own diff system.
Let's recall the behavior of the diff command on the command line. Choosing two files that are similar, the command :
$ diff file1 file2
will output the lines that differ between the two files. This information can be saved as what's known as a patch, but we won't go deeply into that just now.
The only difference between the command line diff tool and git's diff tool is that the git tool is aware of all of the revisions in your repository, allowing each revision of each file to be treated as a full file.
Thus, git diff will output the changes in your working directory that are not yet staged for a commit. To see how this works, make a change in your readme.rst file, but don't yet commit it.
$ git diff
A summarized version of this output can be output with the --stat flag :
$ git diff --stat
To see only the differences in a certain path, try:
$ git diff HEAD -- [path]
To see what IS staged for commit (that is, what will be committed if you type git commit without the -a flag), you can try :
$ git diff --cached
git log : Viewing the History
A log of the commit messages is kept by the repository and can be reviewed with the log command.
$ git log
commit 1863aefd7db752f58226264e5f4282bda641ddb3
Author: Joshua Smith <joshua.r.smith@gmail.com>
Date: Wed Feb 8 16:08:08 2012 -0600
This is the first commit. It adds a readme file.
There are some useful flags for this command, such as
-p
-3
--stat
--oneline
--graph
--pretty=short/full/fuller/oneline
--since=X.minutes/hours/days/weeks/months/years or YY-MM-DD-HH:MM
--until=X.minutes/hours/days/weeks/months/years or YY-MM-DD-HH:MM
--author=<pattern>
git reset : Unstaging a staged file
git reset filename (opposite of 'git add filename')
git checkout : Discarding unstaged modifications (git checkout has other purposes)
git checkout -- filename
git rm : Removing a file
git rm filename (Removes a file from the repository)
Exercise :
1) Create 5 files in your directory with one line of content in each file.
2) Commit the files to the repository.
3) Change 2 of the 5 files and commit them.
4) Undo the changes in step 3)
5) Print out the last entry in the log.
git branch : Listing, Creating, and Deleting Branches
Branches are parallel instances of a repository that can be edited and version controlled in parallel. They are useful for pursuing various implementations experimentally or maintaining a stable core while developing separate sections of a code base.
Without an argument, the branch command lists the branches that exist in your repository.
$ git branch
* master
The master branch is created when the repository is initialized. With an argument, the branch command creates a new branch with the given name.
$ git branch experimental
$ git branch
* master
experimental
To delete a branch, use the -d flag.
$ git branch -d experimental
$ git branch
* master
git checkout : Switching Between Branches, Abandoning Local Changes
The git checkout command allows context switching between branches as well as abandoning local changes.
To switch between branches, try
$ git branch newbranch
$ git checkout newbranch
$ git branch
How can you tell we've switched between branches? When we used the branch command before there was an asterisk next to the master branch. That's because the asterisk indicates which branch you're currently in.
git merge : Merging Branches
At some point, the experimental branch may be ready to become part of the core or two testing branches may be ready to be combined for further integration testing. The method for combining the changes in two parallel branches is the merge command.
Exercise : Create and Merge Branches
Step 1 : Create two new branches and list them
$ git branch first
$ git branch second
Step 2 : Make changes in each new branch and commit them.
$ git checkout first
Switched to branch 'first'
$ touch firstnewfile
$ git add firstnewfile
$ git commit -am "Added firstnewfile to the first branch."
[first 68eba44] Added firstnewfile to first branch.
0 files changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 firstnewfile
$ git checkout second
Switched to branch 'second'
$ touch secondnewfile
$ git add secondnewfile
$ git commit -am "Added secondnewfile to the second branch."
[second 45dd34c] Added secondnewfile to the second branch.
0 files changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 secondnewfile
Step 3 : Merge the two branches into the core
$ git checkout first
Switched to branch 'first'
$ git merge second
Merge made by recursive.
0 files changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 secondnewfile
$ git checkout master
Switched to branch 'master'
$ git merge first
Updating 1863aef..ce7e4b5
Fast-forward
0 files changed, 0 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 firstnewfile
create mode 100644 secondnewfile
git clone : Copying a Repository
Yesterday, you checked out a git type repository at https://github.com/USERNAME/boot-camps/tree/YYYY-MM-PLACE
When you clone the Original repository, the one that is created on your local machine is a copy, and will behave as a fully fledged local repository locally. However, with the right configuration, it will be able to pull changes from collaborators to your local machine and push your changes to the Original repository. We'll get to that soon, but for now, let's fork the repository from GitHub.
Exercise : Cloning a Repository from GitHub
Step 1 : Pick any repository you like. There are many cool projects hosted on github. Take a few minutes here, and pick a piece of code.
Step 2 : Clone it. If you didn't find anything cool, you can chose the "instructional" Spoon-Knife repository:
$ git clone git@github.com/octocat/Spoon-Knife.git
Cloning into Spoon-Knife...
remote: Counting objects: 24, done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (21/21), done.
remote: Total 24 (delta 7), reused 17 (delta 1)
Receiving objects: 100% (24/24), 74.36 KiB, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (7/7), done.
Step 3 : You should see many files download themselves onto your machine. Let's make sure it worked. Change directories to the source code and list the contents.
$ cd Spoon-Knife
$ ls
git pull : Pulling updates from the Original Repository
Updating your repository is like voting. You should update early and often especially if you intend to contribute back to the upstream repository and particularly before you make or commit any changes. This will ensure you're working with the most up-to-date version of the repository. Updating won't overwrite any changes you've made locally without asking, so don't get nervous. When in doubt, update.
$ git pull
Already up-to-date.
Since we just pulled the repository down, we will be up to date unless there has been a commit by someone else to the Original repository in the meantime.