Git and GitHub: A Quick Reference

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Git and GitHub

This document is intended for students who participated in the Packtober Rest event (in October) and want a quick reference on how to use git and GitHub.

Moving an Existing Project to GitHub

Let's say we have an existing project called foo that we want to upload to GitHub.

To do this:

1. Open GitHub and sign in.
2. Click New, the button just to the right of Repositories
   
3. Enter a descriptive repository name and click Create repository (you may also want to choose a license)
   
4. Open a terminal in the project's directory (in VSCode it's Ctrl+`)
   • If the project isn't using git yet,
     • ...run git init . in the project's root directory
     • ...run git add . to add all files in the current directory (which is represented by .) to git.
     • Then, run git commit -m "a description of the commit here". Note that -m stands for --message.
5. Follow the instructions shown on GitHub to push the project!
   

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Cloning an Existing Repository

First, let's get the repository's clone URL:

From here, the repository can be cloned either from a graphical frontend for git or from the command line:

From the command line

To get a copy of a repository on your computer, we use the git clone command!

1. On Mac/Linux open a terminal. On Windows, open Git Bash.
2. The cd command changes the directory the terminal is in. The ls command lists the files in the current directory. Use these commands to move to the location you want to save the code from the repository.
   
3. Use the git clone <url> command, pasting the repository's clone URL copied above (on some terminals, paste is Ctrl+Shift+V):

bash$ git clone https://github.com/UWAppDev/uwappdev.github.io.git
Cloning into 'uwappdev.github.io'...
remote: Enumerating objects: 737, done.
remote: Counting objects: 100% (370/370), done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (241/241), done.
remote: Total 737 (delta 175), reused 243 (delta 102), pack-reused 367
Receiving objects: 100% (737/737), 10.07 MiB | 11.96 MiB/s, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (402/402), done.
bash$ cd uwappdev.github.io
bash$

You've cloned the repository!

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From VSCode

1. Open the version control window (do File > New Window first if you're currently in a project):
   
2. Paste the repository's clone URL (see above).
   
3. Choose where you want to clone the repository to and click open!

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Pushing Changes to GitHub

This assumes that you've already set up a GitHub repository for a project. If not, see either the cloning or Moving a Project to GitHub sections.

From VSCode

1. Open the project in VSCode
   
2. Save the files you've changed!
3. Add the changes:
   
4. Write a message describing the changes and click "commit"!
   
5. Click the "publish changes" (or sync) button!
   

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From the command line

1. Open a terminal in the project's directory
2. Add the files to git (let git know that files might have changed)

# To add all files
bash$ git add .

# To add a single file
bash$ git add path/to/file

3. Push!

bash$ git push
bash$

Note: If you don't want to enter your password every time you push, consider authenticating with SSH.

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Contributing to a Project

1. Create a copy of the project you can write to on GitHub (fork the project).
   
2. Wait for it to finish forking...
3. Clone the repository (see instructions above).
4. When ready to suggest changes to the main repository, click Contribute (be sure to commit and push first!)
   

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Git Resources

• https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2
• https://githubtraining.github.io/training-manual/
• https://github.com/dscatuw/GitStarted

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