Appendix - Common Git workflow tasks

This Appendix describes several common tasks you might use regularly.

Throw away an uncommitted branch and start over

Revert all files back to the previous commit.
```
git reset --hard
```
This resets all files that have changed since the last commit. This is a way to undo your changes and get back to a known state.

Keeping your repos in sync

Pull the upstream main into your working branch again.
```
cd C:\github
cd C:\github\azure-docs-pr
git checkout <main>
git pull upstream <main>
```
The checkout command ensures that you are in the default branch of your local repository. The pull command copies the current version of the <main> branch from the upstream remote into the currently selected branch of your local clone.
Push the local main branch into your fork.
```
git push origin main
```
The push command uploads the current state of your local repository into your fork on GitHub.
Note
While this isn’t required, it’s recommended as a best practice to keep your local repository and your remote fork in sync with the official source repository. This is a good practice to do if you have been away from working in a repository for any extended period of time.

Deleting a branch

Delete branch from your fork.
Branches should be deleted after they’re merged into the official repository. This prevents the visual clutter of a long list of branches in your repository. These branches also get propagated to all forks of the repository.
```
git push origin --delete branchName
```
This updates your fork by telling it to delete the branch from the repository in GitHub. Depending on how you create a branch there may be a remote tracking branch. This happens automatically for main when you clone. If the branch has a remote tracking branch, it is deleted as well.
If the branch has been deleted from your fork already or if you need to delete a tracking branch without deleting the branch from your fork, use the following commands:
```
# List remote tracking branches
git branch -vr

# Delete the remote tracking branch
git branch -Dr origin/branchName
```
Delete the local branch.
```
git branch -D branchName
```
This prevents it from being accidentally pushed later. If the branch has unmerged changes, git warns you and won’t delete the branch.

Restore a file from a previous commit

For this scenario, you want to recover an older version of a file from a previous commit. First you need to find the branch name or commit that contains the version of the file you want to restore. You can do this by looking at the history of the file on GitHub or seaching the local git log. Then you can restore the file from that commit.

Checkout the branch you want to restore the file to.
```
git checkout mybranch
```
Restore the previous version with the following command:
```
git checkout <branchname or SHA of commit> -- <path to file>
```
For example:
```
git checkout 9eab620 -- relative-path\filename.md
```
Now the file has been restored. You can use this same checkout process to restore any number of files. This could be useful if you accidentally deleted files and need them restored.
Update the file using VS Code, as necessary.

Add and commit your changes.

git add --all
git commit -m "description of the changes"

Push your changes up into your fork.
```
git push origin mybranch
```
Now your fork is in sync with your local repository. You are ready to send a pull request to have your changes merged into the official repository.

Squashing a working branch

git checkout <main>
git pull upstream <main>
git checkout <working-branch>
git merge-base <main> <working-branch>
This gets the SHA of the where we started <working-branch>.
git rebase -i <SHA of merge-base>
This opens the interactive rebase editor. You can squash commits by changing pick to squash. When you close the editor, the rebase completes. Now you have squashed your previous commits into one new commit without changing the merge-base (starting point) of the branch.
If you want to move the merge-base to the current HEAD of <main>, use the following command to rebase: git rebase <main>
git push <remote> <working-branch> -f
This force push rewrites the commit history back to the <remote>.

Editing someone else’s PR

Pull their PR into a new local working branch.
git fetch upstream pull/<pull_request_number>/head:newbranch
Checkout the new working branch
Make your changes
Submit a PR to merge your working branch into theirs

Update local repo after master is renamed to main

# Update local repo after master is renamed to main
# Go to the master branch
git checkout master
# Rename master to main locally
git branch -m master main
# Get the latest commits from the server
git fetch
# Remove the link to origin/master
git branch --unset-upstream
# Add a link to origin/main
git branch -u origin/main
# Update the default branch to be origin/main
git symbolic-ref refs/remotes/origin/HEAD refs/remotes/origin/main
# push main to your fork
git push origin main
# delete master from your fork
git push origin --delete master

Find common ancestor of a branch

# get common ancestor
git merge-base <base-branch-ref> <working-branch-ref>

Appendix - Common Git Workflow Tasks

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