Git Cheatsheet

Gourav Goyal

Gourav Goyal

Oct 28, 2021

Jargon

  • remote - remote means server like github, bitbucket, etc.

  • local - your git repo stored in PC

  • remote repository - your git repo stored on github, bitbucket, etc.

  • origin - origin is your remote repo (from where you did git clone)

  • upstream - upstream is their main repo (from which you have forked, useful to get latest changes from their repo releases)

  • tag - you can create a tag when doing software releases

  • main - it's the head branch named main (default created branch for any new repo, earlier it was used to be master)

  • HEAD - head always refers to the latest commit on your current branch.

  • fetch - just download latest changes from a remote branch in separate path and do not integrate with your repo. git merge is required to integrate these changes

  • pull - means getting latest changes from a remote branch into your branch (git pull = git fetch + git merge) To pull from your remote branch: git pull

    To pull from remote main branch: git pull origin main

  • commit - means adding a record entry of your changes e.g. git commit -m "added feature X"

  • push - means uploading your local commits to a remote server. To push commits to your remote branch: git push To push commits to remote main branch: git push origin main

  • merge conflict - when you make changes to a file and someone else make some other changes to the same file and along the same line numbers you get merge conflict. Happens often during pull/push or merging a PR.

Git workflows

  • Option A: Clone main repo -> create a new branch -> do your thing -> send PR to main branch
  • Option B: Fork from the main repo -> do your thing -> send PR

Add local git repo to Github

Create new repo on Github and push local git repo code to it.

(requires Github CLI)

Run inside root of local git repo:

gh repo create ( -> Push an existing local repository to GitHub)
git branch -M main
git push -u origin main

Stage & Commit

git add . (stage ALL new,modified files)

git add -A (stage ALL new,modified,deleted files)

git add file1.txt file2.txt file3.txt

git add -i (interactive add/revert)

git commit -m 'fixed this and that'

Git append (commit using last commit msg)

git commit --reuse-message=HEAD

Git add+commit

  • It also adds newly created files
git add -A ; git commit -m "Your Message" (powershell)
git add -A && git commit -m "Your Message" (bash)

Push/Pull

git push origin

git push upstream

git push upstream/some_branch

git push origin HEAD (push local changes to remote branch with same name)

Pull from main to dev branch

git pull origin main (pull latest changes from remote main branch into local dev branch)

Download big repository on poor bandwidth

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/34389446/how-do-i-download-a-large-git-repository/52090961#52090961

Remove untracked files from local and remote

  1. add those files to .gitignore
  2. git rm -r --cached .
  3. git add .
  4. git commit -am "Remove ignored files"
  5. git push

PR / Review

create PR inside VSCode

  • CLI: gh pr create --fill (need to install Github CLI)

  • GUI: use VSCode extension: GitHub Pull Requests and Issues

  • Github:

    1Visit repo on github.com and switch to your branch.

    1. Go to Pull requests section -> New pull request

List PRs

  • gh pr list

See all changes from a PR as uncommitted changes

Option A:

  1. checkout PR (100) in 'detached HEAD' state git fetch origin pull/100/head && git checkout FETCH_HEAD
  2. show as uncommitted changes git reset main
  3. switch back to main branch and carry these changes git switch -

Option B:

Branch

checkout remote branch

(you can also enable autofetch in VSCode settings to avoid doing git fetch every time)

git fetch && git checkout branch_name

Create local branch

code will be copied from current branch

  git checkout -b feature_x

create local branch from some other branch

git checkout -b feature_x main

push newly created branch to remote

branch is not available to github.com unless you push it separately

  git push --set-upstream origin feature_x

Add Remote branch

origin is your repo on github.com

  git remote add origin https://github.com/user/repo.git

Add upstream

upstream is their main repo from which you have forked

  git remote add upstream https://github.com/their_user/repo.git

Create new local version branch of an upstream branch

  git checkout -b feature_x upstream/main (main is the branch name)

switch branch

  git checkout feature_x

delete the branch

git branch -d feature_x

Get URL of Github repo

git remote show origin

git remote set-url origin new.git.url

Work between branches

Push from one branch to another

git push origin from_branch:to_branch

Git pull without committing local changes

  • hide your local uncommitted changes temporarily
git stash -u (-u means --include-untracked)
  • show all stashes
git stash list
  • get latest changes
git pull
  • now unhide your local uncommitted changes (pop will restore only latest stash) git stash pop or git stash apply

git stash pop restore changes and also removes it from stack, git stash apply restores it but still keeps it on stack for possible later reuse (or you can then git stash drop it). So git stash pop is git stash apply && git stash drop

move uncommitted changes to another branch

  1. uncommitted changes do not belong to any branch so just switch branch
git checkout -b <new-branch>
  1. Push this branch to remote
git push --set-upstream origin new-branch
  1. Commit these changes or stash them to later pick it up

Save uncommitted changes and switch branch

  1. save uncommitted changes to stack for current branch stack
git stash -u (-u means --include-untracked)
  1. checkout different branch
git checkout B
  1. Recover stash To pop stashed changes from previous A branch
git checkout A
git stash apply (will recover changes from last stack)
  • To see all stashes git stash list

clone uncommitted changes to new branch

  1. save uncommitted changes to stack for current branch stack
git stash -u (-u means --include-untracked)
git stash apply (will recover changes from last stack)
  1. carry these changes to new_branch and do your work
git checkout -b new_branch
  1. To recover stashed changes from previous A branch
git checkout A
git stash apply
  • To see all stashes git stash list

Copy specific commit from one branch to another

Ex: copy one commit from dev to main

using gui:

  • switch to main: git checkout main
  • run gitk --all
  • right-click on desired commit and select Cherry-pick this commit

using cli:

  • get commit sha1-id you want to copy
git checkout dev
git log (copy desired commit_id)
(to exit type q)
  • copy commit:
git checkout main
git cherry-pick <commit_id>

Repo Status

git status

Show latest commits

using cli:

 git log
(to exit type q)

using gui:

gitk

Display current branch name

  git branch

Git GUI (free)

Windows

Mac

Built-in git GUI

gitk

Git interactive commands

git add -i

use colorful git output

git config color.ui true

I f*cked up

Switch to an old commit

  • Temporarily switch by creating new branch

    git checkout 0d1d7fc32  (commit id)

  • Revert current branch to an older commit

    git reset --hard <commidId> && git clean -f

Add new changes to last commit

  • If you pushed last commit to remote
git add .
git commit --amend --no-edit (`--no-edit` to keep last commit msg)
git push --force
  • If you didn't push the commit to remote
git reset HEAD^

Then add all files and commit again

Resolve Merge Conflicts

revert all my changes and pull latest from main

git reset --hard HEAD
git pull -s recursive -X theirs upstream branch_remote

Discard all uncommitted changes (local)

git checkout .

Revert last local commit but keep the changes in my pc

git reset HEAD^

Revert last remote commit (remote, untraceable)

  1. Get that commit to local git pull

  2. Remove commit locally git reset HEAD^

  3. Force-push the last HEAD commit to remote git push origin +HEAD

Revert all local changes and local commits (local)

fetch the latest history from the remote and point your local master branch at it

git fetch origin git reset --hard origin/main (main is the branch name)

Reset dev branch to main

git checkout dev
git reset --hard origin/main
git pull origin main
git push -f

Clean up a fork and restart it from the upstream

git reset --hard upstream/main (main is the branch name of original repo)
git push origin my_branch --force (or git push origin HEAD --force)

git Users

Set

git config --local user.name "localuser"
git config --local user.email "localuser@example.com"
git config --global user.name "globaluser"
git config --global user.email "globaluser@example.com"

Get

git config --local user.name
git config --local user.email
git config --global user.name
git config --global user.email

git config --list

Remember Me

Remember username & password

  1. Secured Way (Store globally)
    git config --global credential.helper manager //secured way for Windows

    git push http://example.com/repo.git
    Username: <type your username once>
    Password: <type your password once>
  1. Unsecured way (Store globally)
    git config credential.helper store //username & password stored in plain-text in "%UserProfile%\.git-credentials"
    git push http://example.com/repo.git
    Username: <type your username once>
    Password: <type your password once>
  1. Unsecured way (Store locally per repo)
    //saved in file 'cred' inside repo .git folder. Need to manually delete this file.
    git config credential.helper 'store --file=.git/cred'
  1. Secured Way (Store in Cache)
    git config credential.helper 'cache --timeout=864000' // 10 days expiry
    git credential-cache exit // remove it from cache before timeout

Remove credentials

git config --unset credential.helper
git config --local --unset credential.helper
git config --global --unset credential.helper
git config --system --unset credential.helper
//Windows: delete from Control Panel\User Accounts\Credential Manager

Misc

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Gourav Goyal

Gourav Goyal

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