Git Branching

Learn How to Manage Multiple Versions of a Project with Branching

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Key Concepts

Review core concepts you need to learn to master this subject

The Master Branch

Creating a New Branch

Viewing the Current Branch

Merge Conflicts

Deleting a Branch

Merging Branches

The Master Branch

$ git init
Initialized empty Git repository in /home/ccuser/new-project/.git/
$ echo "Hello World!" >> hello.txt
$ git add hello.txt 
$ git commit -m 'initial commit'
[master (root-commit) bb0e565] initial commit
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
 create mode 100644 hello.txt
$ git branch
* master

In Git, the main project is completed on the master branch. Making your first commit in a new git repository will automatically create a masterbranch. Create new branches from the master branch to develop new features for a project. These branches can be merged into master at a later time to incorporate the new features. You can use git branch to check what branch you’re on.

Git Branching

Lesson 1 of 1

1
git branch
Up to this point, you’ve worked in a single Git branch called master. Git allows us to create branches to experiment with versions of a project. Imagine you want to create version of a story with…
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2
branching overview
The diagram to the right illustrates branching. * The circles are commits, and together form the Git project’s commit history. * New Branch is a different version of the Git project. It conta…
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3
git branch 2
Right now, the Git project has only one branch: master. To create a new branch, use: git branch new_branch Here new_branch would be the name of the new branch you create, like photos or blur…
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4
git checkout
Great! You just created a new branch. The master and fencing branches are identical: they share the same exact commit history. You can switch to the new branch with git checkout branch_name He…
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5
commit on a new branch
Congratulations! You have switched to a new branch. All the commands you do on master, you can also do on this branch. For example, to add files to the staging area, use: git add filename And…
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6
git merge
What if you wanted include all the changes made to the fencing branch on the master branch? We can easily accomplish this by merging the branch into master with: git merge branch_name For ex…
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7
merge conflict I
The merge was successful because master had not changed since we made a commit on fencing. Git knew to simply update master with changes on fencing. What would happen if you made a commit on mast…
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8
merge conflict II
Let’s say you decide you’d like to merge the changes from fencing into master. Here’s where the trouble begins! You’ve made commits on separate branches that alter the same line in conflicting …
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9
delete branch
In Git, branches are usually a means to an end. You create them to work on a new project feature, but the end goal is to merge that feature into the master branch. After the branch has been integra…
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10
generalizations
Let’s take a moment to review the main concepts and commands from the lesson before moving on. * Git branching allows users to experiment with different versions of a project by checking out se…
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