Git has revolutionized the way teams collaborate, optimizing workflows and improving productivity.
Knowing Git is helpful in many roles, from QA to developer. This blog post aims to serve as a comprehensive guide to Git, covering everything from the basics of committing, branching, and merging to exploring more advanced functionalities. We'll explore how to cherry-pick code from features still in progress, use Git bisect to find bugs, and manage multiple features in parallel with worktrees.
Understanding Git
Git is an open-source, distributed version control system that allows multiple individuals to collaborate on a project simultaneously. Originally developed by Linus Torvalds in 2005, Git has become the go-to solution for managing source code and tracking changes over time.
Simply put, Git is a tool that helps people work on software projects together, keeping track of changes they make to the project's files.
Imagine using Git like working on a story: initial commits set the scene, branching allows for exploring subplots without altering the main narrative, and merging weaves these tales into the overarching story.
Each commit in Git represents a clear, accessible snapshot of the project at a specific point, improving code reviews and collaboration.
What are the benefits of using Git for collaboration?
So, how does Git collaboration work? As I said before, Git allows multiple developers to work on the same project simultaneously from different branches, ensuring changes are tracked and merged seamlessly. This is achieved through pull requests, where changes can be reviewed and discussed before being integrated, thereby maintaining the project's integrity and fostering a collaborative development environment.
Let's see what are the benefits of using Git for collaboration.
1. Version control and tracking changes with Git
One of Git's core advantages is its ability to track changes to files and directories over time. This ensures that no work is lost, and if mistakes are made, they can be easily rolled back. Team members can confidently experiment with different approaches, knowing they can always revert to a previous state if needed.
2. Branching and merging allows for collaborative workflow
Git's branching and merging capabilities enable parallel development. Each team member can create their own branch to work on specific features or fixes without disrupting the main project. Once their changes are ready, these branches can be merged back into the main branch, optimizing collaboration and reducing conflicts.
So, although team members work on different parts of a project simultaneously, they don't interfere with each other's work. This is a great benefit in larger projects where multiple features are being developed concurrently. Developers can focus on their tasks without worrying about stepping on each other's toes.
3. It enables remote collaboration
Git's distributed nature is ideal for remote teams. Team members can work from different locations while contributing effectively to the project. Centralized repositories hosted on platforms like GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket enable smooth remote collaboration, ensuring teams can work together effectively, regardless of location.
The basic Git commands for easy collaboration
Starting to work together with Git is easy, thanks to some straightforward commands that make for easier team collaboration. First, let's explain the basic Git commands:
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Git init: Sets up a new Git repository and gets it ready to track changes.
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Git clone: Makes a copy of an existing repository so you can work on it by yourself.
1. Set up your project
Initialize a new project: Create a new directory for your project and run the git init command to initialize a new Git repository.
If you want an alternative, you can clone an existing repository to work on it independently.
git clone https://github.com/projectname/website.git
2. Make changes and commit
Adding changes to the staging area: After making changes or adding new files, use the git add command to stage them.
git add index.html styles.css
After that, commit the staged changes to your local repository.
git commit -m "Add index.html and styles.css"
Git workflow diagram
Effective commit messages are essential for maintaining a clear project history. They help other team members understand the purpose of each change, making collaboration more efficient. A good commit message should be concise yet descriptive, providing context for the change it represents.
3. Create and manage branches with Git
At some point, you will need to work with a new branch. Let's imagine we are working on creating a new blog on our page, so create a new branch when starting work on a new feature git checkout -b feature/New-blog or switch to an existing one git checkout feature/New-blog.
Branching is a cornerstone of Git's collaborative features. Creating a new branch for every new feature or fix keeps the main project stable as developers work on improvements simultaneously. The git branch and git checkout commands simplify this process, allowing developers to move between different project versions effortlessly.
Visualisation of Git checkout
When working on a new feature or fix, it's important to keep track of your current branch to ensure that your changes are made in the correct context. This helps maintain a clean and organized codebase, making it easier for team members to follow along.
You can switch back to the main branch or to any existing branch as needed.
git checkout main
git checkout -
When you merge a feature branch, you integrate its changes back into the main branch, combining the two sets of modifications into one unified project version.
git merge feature/New-blog
Visualisation of Git merge
Git's real strength for teamwork comes from its branching and merging features, which provide a solid system for development teams to work on different parts of a project simultaneously.
This means the team can work on new features, bug fixes, and tests in separate branches. Teams can improve and try out new ideas without interfering with the main project. This separation is important for maintaining a stable code base while allowing the freedom to explore and iterate on new ideas independently.
Using branches often is a smart move that makes managing and reviewing code easier. It keeps changes separate, improves the quality of the code, and lets the team work on different things at the same time. When it's time to combine everyone's work, merging brings the changes from various branches into one. Sometimes, merging can cause conflicts, but it's a key part of bringing everything together.
Git is supported with tools like git merge --abort, which is designed for you if you want to stop git merge.
4. Share and update code
Updating your local repository with changes from the remote repository is essential to ensure your work is in sync with the team's progress. This process, known as pulling changes, involves using the git pull command to fetch updates from the remote and merge them into your local branch.
git pull origin main
This step ensures that your local repository is up-to-date before you begin working on new features or making further changes, minimizing the potential for conflicts.
Once your features are developed and thoroughly tested, sharing your work with the team becomes the next critical step. The git push command lets you upload your local branch changes to the remote repository, keeping everyone on the same page regarding the project's current state.
git push origin main
After pushing your changes, it's common practice to initiate a pull request. This step is crucial for merging your feature branches into the main branch. Pull requests are a collaborative tool, allowing team members to review, discuss, and approve the changes. This review process ensures that all contributions are thoroughly vetted and tested before they become part of the main project. This maintains code quality and project integrity.
What are some advanced Git commands for efficient collaboration?
As teams and projects expand, mastering advanced Git techniques is key to keeping collaboration smooth and efficient.
When beginning your day, it’s always good to check the status of your working directory to see the current state of your work. The git status command offers a snapshot of what has changed, providing clarity before moving forward. If you need to switch your work to another feature and check out a new branch, stash your current progress; the git stash command temporarily shelves your changes, allowing for a clean transition. Later, you can continue with work on that branch with a simple git stash apply.
Renaming a branch for clarity or organizational purposes can be done with git branch -m old-name new-name. To incorporate specific changes (commits) from one branch to another, git cherry-pick
Visualisation of Git Cherry Pick
A git log is essential to explore your project's commit history in detail. A similar command that shows the history of reference changes and can be used to recover lost commits, reset branches to a previous state, or just to output your project's history for any reason git reflog.
For situations requiring a step back to a previous state, git reset --hard
Master the Git commands for everyday work
Advanced Git commands
In this section, we’ll explore some more advanced Git commands, which can be very useful even in everyday work and will definitely improve your and your team's efficiency.
Diving deeper, we explore commands like git add -p for interactive staging, allowing you to review and select portions of files for inclusion. For instances where not all changes are ready for staging, git stash -p enables selective stashing, while git stash -u includes untracked files in the stash.
An extremely useful command is git commit —-amend. When you already committed changes but want to edit them or add some, this will also allow you to change the commit message.
One of the most powerful yet cautiously used commands is git rebase. It is a bit controversial; some devs will gladly use it, yet some are extremely cautious with it, to the point that they never use it on bigger projects.
What is the difference between rebase and merge?
One of the decisions involves choosing between rebase and merge to integrate changes from different branches. While both aim to bring disparate lines of development together, they do so in different ways.
Merge combines the changes from two branches without losing any history. It adds a merge commit to the project, showing that two branches were brought together. This keeps the history complete but can make it more complicated because it shows all the twists and turns of development.
Rebase rearranges the feature branch's commits to appear as if they were made directly on top of the main branch's latest commit. It makes the project's history look cleaner and more straightforward by creating a single, linear development path. However, it changes history, which can cause issues for others working in the same branch.
Visualisation of Git Rebase
Why do developers avoid rebase?
So, if rebase is so useful, why do developers still avoid it? Well, using it on shared branches will rewrite commit history, which causes issues for others who have already based their progress on the old git history. Because rebase only edits your version of the repository while all other developers are still working on the initial branch. The rule is simple: don’t use rebase on shared branches unless you are all well synchronized and experienced, and never use it on public branches.
The role of Git worktrees
Every day, most developers find themselves in a situation where they have to direct their current focus to some other feature or hot-fix and switch to a new branch, and in such cases, they usually use git stash. There is an alternative for that, which many would agree is even more efficient, and the command is git worktree.
What are Git worktrees?
git worktree allow for multiple working directories linked to the same Git repository. You can simultaneously work on various branches without mixing changes.
Once set up, switching from your current working directory to a different one is straightforward. You can easily check out the new branch in the new directory and focus on your tasks. After completing your work, you can return to the original directory, where you'll find all your progress exactly as you left it, untouched by the switch to another directory. This setup ensures seamless transitioning between tasks, and your work remains organized.
This is a greater feature for multitasking within the same project, enabling developers to maintain focus on their current tasks while preparing or finalizing others.
How to use Git worktree?
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Starting a new feature often involves the first step of creating a new worktree linked to a specific branch. This allows you to work on the new feature while keeping your current progress untouched, ensuring a clean separation of tasks.
git worktree add -b feature/Feature-name path/to/feature-worktree
Then switch to that worktree with:
cd ../feature-worktree
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You can effortlessly switch between worktrees when managing multiple tasks. This flexibility ensures that each task receives the attention it needs, allowing you to focus on one thing at a time without disrupting your workflow.
git worktree list
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Once you're done with a worktree, you can remove it and clean up your workspace:
git worktree remove ../feature-worktree
Worktrees support diverse workflows, allowing branches to be tied to the same or different directories, offering flexibility in how developers organize their tasks.
Efficient bug hunting with Git bisect
When encountering a bug in code, you often want to know when it was first introduced. Sometimes, bugs might have been there for weeks or months, and manually searching for them in commits could take much time and effort. To simplify that process, a very efficient command git bisect. It offers a rapid solution that automates the search for problematic commits.
How Git bisect works
1. Begin the process by marking the current (bad) commit and identifying a known good commit to initiate the troubleshooting.
git bisect start
git bisect bad HEAD
git bisect good 'commit-hash'
2. Next, Git bisect checks commits between the good and bad markers, asking you to provide feedback on each one. This continues until it pinpoints the exact commit that introduced the bug.
3. After finding the problematic commit, you can fix the issue. To finish the bisect session and return to your normal tasks, just run git bisect reset. This technique simplifies debugging, turning a potentially long search through weeks or months of changes into a manageable process.
The significance of git push and git pull with remote developers
Git enables remote teams to collaborate as effectively as if they were in the same room. With commands like git push and git pull, developers can share their contributions and stay up-to-date with the team's progress, regardless of their physical location.
In this way, every team member can contribute to the project's success. Git push and git pull synchronize code changes among multiple developers working on the same project but possibly in different locations.
Connecting to a remote repository
To collaborate on a Git project, developers connect to a remote repository hosted on platforms like GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket. By setting up a remote connection with commands like git remote add origin [URL], team members can push their local changes to the central repository and pull updates from it, facilitating ongoing collaboration and project development.
How do you use Git for better code quality?
Git isn't just about managing changes; it's a tool for ensuring high code quality through collaborative reviews and adherence to best practices.
Use pull requests for code reviews to ensure code quality
Pull requests are not just a method for submitting changes but an opportunity for code review. By requiring every change to be reviewed through a pull request, teams can ensure that all contributions meet the project's quality standards before merging.
So, if you want to optimize collaboration and ensure code quality, create a pull request.
How to write effective commit messages
Effective commit messages quickly tell other team members about the change, giving them helpful context. There are some universal guidelines for writing useful commit messages (they can vary slightly between projects):
1. Separate the subject from the body with a blank line
2. Limit the subject line to 50 characters
3. Capitalize the subject line
4. Do not end the subject line with a period
5. Use the imperative mood in the subject line
6. Wrap the body at 72 characters
7. Use the body to explain what and why vs. how
8. Include any related issue numbers
What are collaborative workflows in Git?
Collaborative workflows in Git are methodologies that teams adopt to manage the development process of a project efficiently.
The choice of a git workflow often depends on the project's size and nature, as well as the team's structure and preferences. Different workflows cater to different organizational needs. For example:
Feature branch workflow
The Feature Branch Workflow is appreciated for its simplicity and effectiveness. It allows developers to work independently by creating separate branches for each feature or fix, isolating their work from the main codebase. This isolation minimizes conflicts with the production code and enables easy code reviews and testing before merging changes back into the main branch. It adapts to small and large teams and encourages continuous integration practices.
Gitflow workflow
Gitflow is highly structured, making it ideal for projects with scheduled releases and the need to maintain multiple versions in production.
It clearly defines the roles of different branches (such as development, feature, release, and hotfix), which gives a clean separation between development work, releases, and emergency fixes. This workflow particularly benefits larger teams with complex projects requiring a rigorous release schedule.
Pull request workflow
Pull requests are a cornerstone of Git collaboration, especially on platforms like GitHub. They allow developers to notify team members about changes they've pushed to a branch in a repository. Through pull requests, team members can review, discuss, and refine code before it's merged into the main branch.
Forking workflow
The forking workflow is particularly popular in open-source projects. It involves contributors forking a GitHub repository, making changes in their fork, and then submitting them back to the original repository via pull requests.
Wrap-up: Find commands fast
Git has changed how software development teams collaborate, providing a flexible framework for managing complex projects. By understanding and using Git's features—from basic commands to advanced techniques—teams can improve their workflow, ensure code quality, and adapt to software development challenges.
In summary, this blog serves as a user-friendly guide for both novice and even some more experienced developers. The idea is that developers can check the blog daily and quickly find the commands they need. I hope this blog has provided valuable information to all readers, which they can apply to improve team collaboration on their projects. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me.
