Git for Linux - Install and Quickstart Guide

Here’s my workflow for working with Git and Github; the following is assuming working on Linux but working on Windows is fairly similar. Much of this is done seemlessly in Vscode if you want to avoid the command line: https://code.visualstudio.com/download, https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/sourcecontrol/overview.

Install

1. Open a terminal and type:

   sudo apt install git
   

Clone a Repository (repo)

1. cd to where you want the repository cloned

2. git clone https://github.com/yourUsername/yourRepository.git
   

   • could also be a repository from someone else
3. enter username
4. For password:
   1. follow the steps for creating a token: https://docs.github.com/en/authentication/keeping-your-account-and-data-secure/creating-a-personal-access-token
   2. paste in your token for the password
   3. (optional) save the token to a .txt file or something for

Push your changes

1. Mess around with some files in your local repository
2. Push what you have to the origin: https://www.linode.com/docs/guides/how-to-install-git-and-clone-a-github-repository/
   1. cd to your github folder

   2.  git add .
       git status
       git commit -a -m “message for commit”
       git push origin main
      

      Note: if you want to only commit certain files, then replae git add . with git add [insert file name here]

   3. Or if the last command didn’t work: git push origin master or git push origin main; essentially origin is your repository on Github.com, and master/main is the main branch
3. type in username and password

Pull new changes

1. cd to your github folder

2. git pull origin main
   

3. enter username
4. enter token for password

Good overview videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGOj5yH7evk

Branching

Create New Branch

1. git branch
   • This tells you what branch you’re currently on
2. git checkout -b name-of-branch
   • this creates a new branch
3. do your code modifications

4. git add .
   git commit -m “title” -m “description”
   git diff name-of-branch
   

   • this shows the difference between the branch you just created
5. git push

Merge origin/main changes into branch

Let’s say you want to pull changes to the origin/main branch to your branch:

1. commit and push all changes to your current branch)

2. git checkout main
   git pull
   git checkout {name of your branch}
   git merge main
   

Troubleshooting

Problem:

remote: Support for password authentication was removed on August 13, 2021. Please use a personal access token instead.
remote: Please see https://github.blog/2020-12-15-token-authentication-requirements-for-git-operations/ for more information.
fatal: Authentication failed for ‘https://github.com/uw-esolab/sf-learn.git/’

Solution: need a token: https://docs.github.com/en/authentication/keeping-your-account-and-data-secure/creating-a-personal-access-token

Problem: you want to clone a fresh repo over your branch

git clone https://github.com/username/repo.git
Username: your_username
Password: your_token

*Solution: If you don’t care about the changes you made and want to pull the repository, type in: git reset –hard origin

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1125968/how-do-i-force-git-pull-to-overwrite-local-files