git cheat sheet

How to show the remote tracking branch?

git branch -vv
- Caution: Double verbose output is porcelain, so don't rely on it in scripts.
- There is no other non-porcelain way, obviously: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3631706/what-is-this-branch-tracking-if-anything-in-git/16162827#16162827
- For example useful when moving git servers.

git stash show --full-index
- --full-index is a git diff option
- For other output formats see the git diff help

git push -u origin HEAD
- HEAD --> assumes local branch is checked out currently
- -u origin --> let's the local branch track the newly created remote one

Read the excellent article How to Write a Git Commit Message
In a nutshell the commit message should be a continuation of This commit will... and the first line shall be less than 50 chars. I prefer a limit of 70 chars though.

git fetch -p
From the help: "Before fetching, remove any remote-tracking references that no longer exist on the remote"

Say you have a feature branch that is tracked remotely and that you use to create pull requests, e.g. on GitHub. You create commits locally and want to hold back commits when pushing.
Solution is to have another local branch, that does not track a remote pendant.
Let's call the local branch that is tracking a remote one (the one you're using for your PRs), the integration branch.
So how do you merge only certain commits from you local-only branch (i.e. you could call it the staging branch) to your integration branch in order to push it to remote and initiate another PR?
Do it like this
- Observe the commit hash of the commit you want to be included in the PR
- git checkout <integratin-branch-name>
- git merge <commit-hash-of-commit-you-wanna-pr>
- The merge will usually resolve in a fast forward
This way the integration branch (a branch is really just a pointer to a certain commit) is moved to the commit you want to pull

This is relevant if you already pushed a local branch to a remote repository, but have forgotten to setup tracking. In this case, when you type git status, git won't show you how much commits the remote branch is behind your local one.
To setup up a local branch to track an already existing remote branch do this:
- git checkout <branch-name>, to ensure that you're in the right branch
- git branch -u origin/<branch-name>, setting up an upstream branch
- git status, to see how git is now able to tell if the two branches diverge in any way in terms of commits

git diff --name-status <commit> <commit>
-- name-status creates the list of changed files and prefixed each file with the type of change (A, D, M)

git tag -a -m "Tagging first version that is working, although various key objects still included." 0.1 HEAD
- -a --> unsigned tag
- -m --> a readable message
- 0.1 --> the tag name
- HEAD --> the commit the tag should be bound to

There are a lot of ways to specify commits or ranges of commits
Some examples:
- HEAD~1
- HEAD^1
A good overview can be found at https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Tools-Revision-Selection