SKempin

Git Subtree Basics

If you hate git submodule, then you may want to give git subtree a try.

Background

When you want to use a subtree, you add the subtree to an existing repository where the subtree is a reference to another repository url and branch/tag. This add command adds all the code and files into the main repository locally; it's not just a reference to a remote repo.

When you stage and commit files for the main repo, it will add all of the remote files in the same operation. The subtree checkout will pull all the files in one pass, so there is no need to try and connect to another repo to get the portion of subtree files, because they were already included in the main repo.

Adding a subtree

Let's say you already have a git repository with at least one commit. You can add another repository into this respository like this:

patik

Squashing Git Commits

The easy and flexible way

This method avoids merge conflicts if you have periodically pulled master into your branch. It also gives you the opportunity to squash into more than 1 commit, or to re-arrange your code into completely different commits (e.g. if you ended up working on three different features but the commits were not consecutive).

Note: You cannot use this method if you intend to open a pull request to merge your feature branch. This method requires committing directly to master.

Switch to the master branch and make sure you are up to date: