Git Workflows

Overview

Git version control patterns, branching strategies, and team collaboration best practices.

Branching Strategies

Git Flow

main ─────●────────────●─────────────●─────────── \ /
\ release/1.0 release/1.1 \ / \ / develop ──────●───●──────●────●──────●──────────── \ / \ / feature/ feature/ feature/ login payment search

Initialize git flow

git flow init

Start a new feature

git flow feature start user-authentication

Work on feature...

git flow feature finish user-authentication

Start a release

git flow release start 1.0.0

Bug fixes only...

git flow release finish 1.0.0

Hotfix for production

git flow hotfix start critical-bug git flow hotfix finish critical-bug

GitHub Flow (Simplified)

main ─────●──────●──────●──────●──────●─────── \ / \ /
feature/ feature/ feature/ add-auth fix-bug new-ui

1. Create branch from main

git checkout main git pull origin main git checkout -b feature/add-authentication

2. Make changes and commit

git add . git commit -m "feat: add user authentication"

3. Push and create PR

git push -u origin feature/add-authentication gh pr create --title "Add user authentication" --body "..."

4. After review, merge via GitHub

gh pr merge --squash

5. Delete branch

git checkout main git pull origin main git branch -d feature/add-authentication

Trunk-Based Development

main ────●──●──●──●──●──●──●──●──●──── │ │ │ └─────┴────────┴─── short-lived branches (< 1 day)

Small, frequent commits directly to main or via short-lived branches

git checkout main git pull git checkout -b fix/typo-in-readme

Make small change...

git commit -m "fix: typo in README" git push -u origin fix/typo-in-readme

PR, review, merge same day

Common Operations

Commits

Stage specific changes

git add -p # Interactive staging

Commit with message

git commit -m "feat(auth): add JWT token validation"

Amend last commit (not pushed)

git commit --amend -m "feat(auth): add JWT token validation and refresh"

Commit with co-author

git commit -m "feat: implement feature

Co-authored-by: Name <email@example.com>"

Empty commit (trigger CI)

git commit --allow-empty -m "chore: trigger CI build"

Conventional Commits

[optional body]

[optional footer(s)]

Type Description

feat New feature

fix Bug fix

docs Documentation only

style Formatting, no code change

refactor Code change, no new feature or fix

perf Performance improvement

test Adding tests

chore Build, CI, tooling

Examples

git commit -m "feat(api): add user registration endpoint" git commit -m "fix(auth): handle expired token refresh" git commit -m "docs: update API documentation" git commit -m "refactor(db): extract connection pool logic" git commit -m "test(user): add unit tests for validation"

Branching

Create and switch to branch

git checkout -b feature/new-feature

or

git switch -c feature/new-feature

List branches

git branch -a # All branches git branch -vv # With tracking info

Delete branch

git branch -d feature/merged-branch # Safe delete git branch -D feature/unmerged-branch # Force delete

Rename branch

git branch -m old-name new-name

Set upstream

git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/main main

Merging

Merge branch into current

git merge feature/branch

Merge with no fast-forward (always create merge commit)

git merge --no-ff feature/branch

Squash merge (combine all commits)

git merge --squash feature/branch git commit -m "feat: add feature (squashed)"

Abort merge

git merge --abort

Rebasing

Rebase current branch onto main

git fetch origin git rebase origin/main

Interactive rebase (last 3 commits)

git rebase -i HEAD~3

In editor, change 'pick' to:

- squash (s): combine with previous

- fixup (f): combine, discard message

- reword (r): change commit message

- edit (e): stop for amending

- drop (d): remove commit

Continue rebase after resolving conflicts

git add . git rebase --continue

Abort rebase

git rebase --abort

Stashing

Stash changes

git stash git stash push -m "work in progress"

Stash including untracked files

git stash -u

List stashes

git stash list

Apply stash

git stash pop # Apply and remove git stash apply # Apply and keep git stash apply stash@{2} # Apply specific

Show stash contents

git stash show -p stash@{0}

Drop stash

git stash drop stash@{0} git stash clear # Drop all

Undoing Changes

Discard changes in working directory

git checkout -- file.txt git restore file.txt # Git 2.23+

Unstage file

git reset HEAD file.txt git restore --staged file.txt # Git 2.23+

Reset to previous commit (keep changes staged)

git reset --soft HEAD~1

Reset to previous commit (keep changes unstaged)

git reset HEAD~~1 git reset --mixed HEAD~~1

Reset to previous commit (discard changes)

git reset --hard HEAD~1

Revert a commit (create new commit that undoes)

git revert <commit-hash>

Revert merge commit

git revert -m 1 <merge-commit-hash>

Git Hooks

Pre-commit Hook

#!/bin/sh

.git/hooks/pre-commit

Run linting

npm run lint if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then echo "Linting failed. Please fix errors before committing." exit 1 fi

Run type checking

npm run type-check if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then echo "Type checking failed. Please fix errors before committing." exit 1 fi

Check for console.log

if git diff --cached | grep -E '^+.*console.(log|debug|info)' > /dev/null; then echo "Warning: Found console.log statements. Remove before committing." exit 1 fi

Husky + lint-staged

// package.json { "scripts": { "prepare": "husky install" }, "lint-staged": { ".{js,ts,tsx}": [ "eslint --fix", "prettier --write" ], ".{json,md,yml}": [ "prettier --write" ] } }

.husky/pre-commit

#!/bin/sh . "$(dirname "$0")/_/husky.sh"

npx lint-staged

.husky/commit-msg

#!/bin/sh . "$(dirname "$0")/_/husky.sh"

npx --no -- commitlint --edit "$1"

Advanced Operations

Cherry-pick

Apply specific commit to current branch

git cherry-pick <commit-hash>

Cherry-pick multiple commits

git cherry-pick <commit1> <commit2> <commit3>

Cherry-pick without committing

git cherry-pick -n <commit-hash>

Cherry-pick merge commit

git cherry-pick -m 1 <merge-commit-hash>

Bisect (Find Bug Introduction)

Start bisect

git bisect start

Mark current as bad

git bisect bad

Mark known good commit

git bisect good v1.0.0

Git checks out middle commit, test and mark

git bisect good # or git bisect bad

Repeat until found

Git reports the first bad commit

End bisect

git bisect reset

Automated bisect

git bisect start HEAD v1.0.0 git bisect run npm test

Worktrees

Create worktree for parallel work

git worktree add ../project-hotfix hotfix/urgent-fix git worktree add ../project-feature feature/new-feature

List worktrees

git worktree list

Remove worktree

git worktree remove ../project-hotfix

Submodules

Add submodule

git submodule add https://github.com/org/repo.git libs/repo

Clone with submodules

git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/org/project.git

Update submodules

git submodule update --init --recursive

Pull submodule updates

git submodule update --remote

Git Configuration

User config

git config --global user.name "Your Name" git config --global user.email "you@example.com"

Default branch

git config --global init.defaultBranch main

Editor

git config --global core.editor "code --wait"

Aliases

git config --global alias.co checkout git config --global alias.br branch git config --global alias.ci commit git config --global alias.st status git config --global alias.lg "log --oneline --graph --all" git config --global alias.unstage "reset HEAD --" git config --global alias.last "log -1 HEAD"

Pull behavior

git config --global pull.rebase true

Auto-setup remote tracking

git config --global push.autoSetupRemote true

Credential caching

git config --global credential.helper cache git config --global credential.helper 'cache --timeout=3600'

Related Skills

[[devops-cicd]] - CI/CD with Git
[[code-quality]] - Code review practices
[[project-management]] - Agile workflows