LearnInPublic

Git Cheatsheet

These are the most common git commands I use while working on a project.

Contents

• git init
• git clone
• git status
• git remote
• git add
• git commit
• git push
• Other commands
• Resources
• References

git init

git init

What it does:

• Initializes git repo in from CLI

Useful when:

• You start your project! Git will track changes within your repo, but first you’ve got to initialize it.

git clone <URL>

git clone <URL>

What it does:

• Clones a remote repo (i.e., creates a copy on your local machine)

Useful when:

• Cloning an open-source repo to your local machine so you can make contributions
• Cloning your own remote repo to your local machine

git status

git status

What it does:

• Checks the status of the repo
  • Are there any unstaged files?
  • Are files staged and ready to commit?

Useful when:

• You can’t remember if you’re last set of changes were committed or not

git remote add origin <URL>

git remote add origin <URL>

What it does:

• Adds a remote origin to a local repo

Useful when:

• You’ve created a local repo and need to connect it to a remote repo
  • In other words, this tells git where to send the files when you use the git push command

git add <FILENAME>

git add <FILENAME>

What it does:

• Adds untracked changes in file to staging (i.e., they’re ready to commit to the repo)

Useful when:

• You’ve made changes to a project and need to stage those changes before you commit the changes to the repo
  • In other words, you’re happy with the changes and ready to “store” them

Variant

git add .

What it does:

• Adds all files with untracked changes to staging

Useful when:

• You’ve made mutliple changes to multiple changes. With git add you need to list individual file names after the command so this is useful when you’ve made lots changes.

CAUTION: Including all files may also include hidden files (e.g., .DS_Store) within the directory where your repo is located. These kinds of files often contain system metadata, however you may not want them in your repo repository, especially if it’s a public one.

Further, you may be working on a project that contains access keys. If you add these files and commit them, then push them to a public repo they become available to the public. This could be bad news if these keys give access to a private database.

To solve this, you can either move these files to another directory or add them to a .gitignore file. This file contains a list of files and directories that git will ignore (i.e., it won’t track any changes, stage them for commits, or push them to remote repos).

git commit -m "<COMMIT MSG GOES HERE>"

git commit -m "<COMMIT MSG GOES HERE>"

What it does:

• Commits the file changes to the repo along with a message about the changes made (e.g., "fix broken link")

Useful when:

• You’re satisfied with the changes you made and want to “save” them

Variant

git commit -am "<COMMIT MSG GOES HERE>"

What it does:

• Adds all untrack files to staging, then commits them (it’s a 2-for-1 command)
  • Here the -am tag is for adding the untracked files to staging (the a part) and attaching the message (m) for the commit

Useful when:

• You’ve made a lot of changes and don’t want to have to type two separate commands for add and commit (i.e., you’re feeling lazy you’re a productive programmer and want to save time)

git push

git push

What it does:

• Pushes commits to remote repo

Useful when:

• You’ve made your changes and its time to share them with the world!

Variant

git push --all --set-upstream origin

What it does:

• This sets the upstream of the repo to the remote repo so it will push future commits to the remote repo

Useful when:

• You’ve created a repo on your local machine and you want to push the files to a remote repo

Note: Unless you decide to change the upstream, you only need to this once. I usually do it on my first push.

Other commands

• git branch <NAME>: Creates a new branch with desired name (e.g., "add-feature")
• git checkout <NAME>: Moves to specified branch (e.g., from main to add-feature)
• git checkout -b <NAME>: Creates new branch and moves to that branch
• git branch -d <NAME>: Deletes specified branch
• git fetch: Fetches new changes from remote repo
• git merge <NAME>: Merges changes from the named branch into the current branch

Resources

• Git Documentation - Docs are always a good starting place when you want to learn how to use a tool
• Learn Git Branching - Fun interactive resource for beginners to learn how git branching works

References

• What is a .DS_Store file?

License

This code is made available via the GNU GPLv3 license.

You are free to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software under the terms of the GNU GPLv3 license. This means:

• You can freely use and modify the code for any purpose.
• If you distribute the code, you must also provide the source code and license.
• Any changes you make to the code must be released under the same GPL-3.0 license.

For more details, please refer to the full text of the GNU GPLv3 license for this project.

Author

Thank you for reading about this project. If you’d like to connect with me for mentoring, collaboration, or employment opportunities, you can do so via the following links:

• Email
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