Ned's Declassified Git Survival Guide 📚

Introduction

Welcome to Ned's Declassified Git Survival Guide! 📚 In this guide, you'll learn essential Git commands like git checkout and git restore to undo changes, git stash to save uncommitted work temporarily, git cherry-pick🍒 to pull specific commits from one branch to another, and git reflog to recover "lost commits". Whether you're fixing a bug 🐞, changing priorities because your manager decided that, or restoring deleted code, these commands will help you handle common real-case scenarios with confidence 💪. So, let’s dive in and master Git together!

This is what we'll learn today:

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Index 📋

1. Episode 1: First Day of Work & Bugs

   • Using git checkout to restore files from a previous commit.
   • Saving uncommitted changes with git restore.

2. Episode 2: We've Got a New Priority, Houston

   • How to stash untracked files with git stash.
   • Managing stashes and retrieving them when needed.

3. Episode 3: The CoolFeature Crisis!

   • Using git cherry-pick to select and apply specific commits.

4. Episode 4: I Changed My Mind Drama

   • Recovering deleted commits with git reflog.

5. Conclusion

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Episode 1: First Day of Work & Bugs

Let's say we're building a Map Application for your workplace, and we have the following folder structure:

We refactor our main.tsx file because we want MapsApp.tsx to be our main application file, but we accidentally introduce a bug.

We don't realize it and proceed to commit and push it to the remote repository:

(In case you're curious, I'm using gitmoji for cool commit messages.)

Now, you run your project and realize there's a bug in main.tsx because the console tells you, but for some reason, you can't find it—maybe you're nervous, so...

What can I do so I don't get yelled at?

Advice #1: Restoring Files Saves Lives

In this scenario, for simplicity, let's say you've already pushed the project before the refactor as a good practice (otherwise, you're in trouble). You use git log, and it shows you the following:

Since you have a previous good file, you can simply use git log and select the commit hash that you want to restore. In our case, it's this one:

Then, proceed to write:

git checkout 4d7490e src/main.tsx

And you've restored it—tadaa!

Hey, I've only got one commit in my project, can I reverse that?

Advice #2: Use git restore for Uncommitted Changes

You have the following uncommitted changes in main.tsx:

You can confirm they are uncommitted with a git status:

And your git log only has the first commit, where you created your project:

You have two options, one easy and one hard:

# Easy one
git restore src/main.tsx
# Hard one
git checkout -- src/main.tsx

I'll go with restore:

Now our file is clean again! Hooray!

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Episode 2: Hey, We've Got a New Priority, Houston

Now, your manager or team leader decides it's a good day to change priorities (because that’s their thing). Let's say you're creating a new page called MyCoolPage.tsx:

Now, you have to decide: Should I commit this and then rebase the commits, pick the ones I want, and squash them to make it clean?

I'm Going to Spend Too Much Time Just for That Change Later On, What Can I Do?

Advice #3: Stash It, Bro

Be careful in this case! This special example involves creating a new file that doesn't exist in your repository, so you need to use:

git stash --include-untracked
# Or the shorter flag
git stash -u

Now, you can see the file is no longer with us:

But if you write:

git stash list

It's still here:

The name of the stash is stash@{0}.

Now, we've got multiple options:

# We can pop the stash and remove it from the list with a simple
git stash pop
# Or apply it and let it stay in the list so we can access it later with
git stash apply stash@{number of your stash}

I'll go with pop, and you can see it's back:

When I try to use git stash list, nothing shows up because it ultimatewas popped from the list:

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Episode 3: The CoolFeature Crisis!

You're working in a different branch for a feature called feature/myCoolFeature, which has three requirements. You've already completed two of them, so you have two commits in that branch.

Now, your manager tells you: Hey, we need the CoolFeature you implemented from your branch, but only the first one, and we need it now!

You could create a branch from your current one, delete the HEAD commit, and merge it into main, but that’s too much for such a simple task.

Oh man, I need time for this and they need it now, is there a faster way?

Advice #4: Use Cherry-Pick to Get That Commit

GitSurvivalGuide
Go to your main branch with git checkout main and get the log from the other branch with:

git log feature/myCoolFeature

Then, cherry-pick the specific commit:

git cherry-pick 714cf87

And Linus Torvalds (creator of Git & Linux) saves the day again! And if you use git log, you can see your changes are there:

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Episode 4: The “I Changed My Mind” Drama

Let's say you created a new feature:

You add and commit it, but you change your mind and decide to delete it, so you proceed to Google and search how to delete a commit. You find that with a git reset --hard HEAD~1, you proceed to use it.

You're fine until you realize that you want to reuse some code, but now when you use git log, you can't find it. You think:

It's gone forever, now I'm going to waste time...

Advice #5: If You Can't Find It in git log, It's Time to reflog

Just check the magic of this command:

git reflog

Now you've got the hash to restore your commit:

Another happy ending!

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Conclusion 🎓

Congrats dawg, you've just aced your Git survival guide! 🎉 Just like Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide 📚, you now have a nice toolkit to navigate the tricky hallways of version control. From using git checkout to fix those accidental missteps, stashing away uncommitted changes like a pro, cherry-picking commits when the pressure's on, to rescuing lost work with git reflog, you're set to tackle any Git challenge with confidence. 📚🛠️ So, put these tips into practice and keep your projects running smoothly.

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Special thanks to Midu without his Git book, I wouldn't have made this article. 🙏💻✨

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Thank you for reading!

Let me know, dawg, your thoughts or any suggestions about Git in the comments down below 👇