A basic overview and guideline for working with git/github on your projects
In order to fork a repository and contribute to the project, you need to take the following steps:
- Open the GitHub page of the project you want to work on
- Click on the Fork button on the top right of the screen, and then select Create a new fork as below:
You can clone your forked repository in two ways:
- You can clone your forked repository using your favorite IDE easily. We're using VSCode in our example.
You can also clone your repository using the following command:
git clone <url_for_the_repository>
example: git clone https://github.com/bluewave-labs/verifywise.git
Before creating a new branch every time, or after your pull request is merged and your about to move to the next step (e.g. task or issue), you must fetch the latest changes from the original repository and make your forked repository up-to-date. So, here's how you can do it.
- After you've got your pull request merged or before creating a new branch, open the github page of your forked repository and click on the Sync fork button to make your repo up-to-date, as below:
- After syncing, you'll need to perform the following command on your system to fetch the changes on your local, too.
git fetch
To create a new branch and move to the next task or feature, you'll need to perform the command below:
git checkout -b <name_of_the_new_branch>
please note that this command, creates a new branch with reference to the branch you're on while performing this branch.
note: As a best practice, I recommend you to name your branches in a format as below.
[0-9][0-9][0-9]-[Month]-[Day]-[subject]
Example: 001-Mar-17-sidebar
in a format like this, you'll be able to keep everything in order and also keep track of your progress for how big of a task is done in how much time.
After you've developed the feature you wanted and you're done with your task, you will need to add new changes to your github repository.
Here are the steps you'll need to take:
-
Staging(adding) new changes, i.e., deletions, modifications, etc. Here's the command for that:
git add . -
After that, you'll need to commit and better to add a meaningful brief message that shortly describes what you have done in this commit.
git commit -m "<your_message>"Example:git commit -m "Completing the dashboard" -
Now. it's time to push your commited code to your repository
git push
After you push your new changes to your forked repository, you may want to make a pull request to the original repository and contribute to the main project. In that case, first open your forked repository's github page. Click on the Contribute, then Open pull request.
Do not forget to sync and fetch after you got your pull request merged