Developping

Ref:
User-manual: Developing with git

Adding files to the index

To add file to the index do:

$ git add file1 file2 file3

To undo it:

$ git reset -- file1 file2 file3

the previous command do not work before the first commit because you have no HEAD, but you can remove the files from the index while keeping it in the working tree with:

git rm --cached file1 file2 file3

glob expansion

There is a difference in the way the patterns are interpreted by git:

$ git add *.txt

is a shell glob expansion it will add file.txt but not subdir/other.txt while:

$ git add \*.txt

is expanded by git and it will add both.

Adding a part of a file

Ref:
git-add(1), git book: Interactive Staging

For a registered file, that has changed since last commit you can use git add --interactive or -i to select the patch to add to the index:

$ git add -i
  1:        +0/-0       +65/-0 source/developping.rst
  2:    unchanged        +1/-1 source/error_fix.rst

  *** Commands ***
  1: status   2: update       3: revert       4: add untracked
  5: patch    6: diff         7: quit         8: help
  What now> p
  ........
  Stage this hunk [y,n,q,a,d,/,e,?]? e
  Waiting for Emacs...
  ....
  What now> s
            staged     unstaged path
  1:        +7/-0       +58/-0 source/developping.rst
  2:    unchanged        +1/-1 source/error_fix.rst
  .....
  What now> q
  Bye.

Here the patch has be selected by editing the patch in emacs.

You can also use tools like git-gui(1), magit, or one of the many guis availables to select the hunks you want to stage.

Adding a part of a new file

Now if the file is yet unregistered you cannot add only a part with git add -i.

But you can use the sequence:

$ git add -N new_file
$ git add -i

git add -N create an entry for new-file in the index with no content.

Then the interactive add is done like above.

Well formed commits

Summary of A Note About Git Commit Messages :

  1. Short (50 chars or less) summary
  2. Blank line.
  3. More detailed explanatory text wrapped to about 72 cols.
  4. Further paragraphs come after blank lines.
  5. You can use bulleted text with a hyphen or asterisk preceded by a single space
  6. Use the present tense.

Adding an empty commit at root of a branch.

Refs:
git symbolic-ref, git checkout, git clean
$ #store inexistent ref: newroot in HEAD
$ git symbolic-ref HEAD refs/heads/newroot
$ # wipe the index
$ git rm --cached -r .
$ # clean the worktree
$ git clean -df
$ #create the branch newroot with an empty commit
$ git commit --allow-empty -m 'root commit'
$ # rebase everything over newroot
$ git rebase newroot master
  • repeat for other branches you want to rebase on the same newroot
  • You can then move to some branch and remove newroot with git branch -d newroot.

Recent git have the --orphan option to checkout to create a new branch starting from nowhere. You can also do:

$ git checkout --orphan newroot
$ clear the index and the working tree
$ git rm -rf .
$ git commit --allow-empty -m 'root commit'
$ git rebase newroot master