Git: more newbie questions

[ninetydegrees]

1) If you're working on bug A on branch A then want to work on completely unrelated bug B on branch B, do you need to stash you changes on A checkout develop then create branch B?

Answer: yes, but see comments about using git commit and git commit --amend in your workflow.

2) When can you use git diff? Before add only? Because otherwise it gives me nothing and I have to use git status -v.

Answer: possibly with git diff --cached or git diff HEAD^ HEAD (untested)

3) Oh I feel so stupid for asking this but how do you get out of git diff or git log on PuTTY? Ctrl+C and Ctrl+X don't work.

Answer: the magic key is 'q' and this is related to PAGER and not PuTTY

4) If you're working on bug A on branch A and have reached a point where you want to do some more work but be easily able to revert to where you were before, what is the best route? Several commits? Creating a subbranch A1 (is that possible?)? Is that where merge is useful? I'm having the hardest time understanding how merge can be used concretely.

Answer: several commits is indeed the best route; the concept of 'subbranches' isn't valid.

5) In git config, is there a way to reset the value of core.editor to whatever is the default on your computer (without naming the editor)?

Answer: yes, with git config --global --unset core.editor

Comments

[momijizukamori]

I'm glad you ask these things so I don't have to *g*

[ninetydegrees]

XD

[momijizukamori]

I was wondering similar things, and also clutching mercurial queues close because aaaaah I know that system.

[ninetydegrees]

You know what? I've been using Git for what? Less than a week? and it's so simple and so intuitive I've almost forgotten how I used to do things in Mercurial. Juggling between different things seemed easy on Mercurial because you were used to it but doing it on Git is *actually* easy and so much safer if you remember to stash or commit your changes. You're gonna love it. Also, no more zips or whatever: you can include everything in your patch and the images are displayed on GH.

[denise]

Yeah, I was totally trepidatious about OH NO HUGE NEW THING TO LEARN. then I tried it. NEVER GOING BACK, THANK YOU

[ninetydegrees]

I do love my Windows 7 (first one I bought... ahem) but I imagine this is what it feels like when you switch to a Mac OS.

[foxfirefey]

Hearing you say that you are now having a good experience with this transition relieves me to no end.

[ninetydegrees]

You and fu have been tremendously helpful and I cannot thank you enough for that. <3 <3 <3

[momijizukamori]

Yeah, Dre was mentioning the images thing to me at one point - there was a way to enable git-style patches like that in MQ but I never enababled it.

Guess I'll take the plunge and move my Hack over today *g*