Git Collaboration 1

Learning Objectives

• Use git from the command line to stage, commit and push local changes to a remote GitHub repository
• Explain the purpose of the commands git status and git log.
• Collaborate with a partner using git and GitHub

Introduction

Git is a tool we use to manage changes in our code projects.

Exercise 1

Decide who's Bob and who's Alice.

Alice, on your computer:

• Create a new directory called 'introductions'
• Initialise the directory as a new git repository

Try out git status and see what it says — it's usually useful information. If it says 'Not a git repository' then something is wrong.

Exercise 2

Alice, on your computer:

• Create a new file called index.html in the directory called 'introductions'

• Ask your pair partner their name

• Add the following to it, replacing NAME with their name:

  <h1>Hello NAME!</h1>

• Stage and commit this change.

Try out git log. You should see your commit there.

Exercise 3

Alice, on your computer:

• Create a new GitHub repository called 'introductions'
• Set up your local git repository to point towards the GitHub repository
• Push your local changes to the Github repository
• Add your partner as a collaborator on the Github repository

Check out the repository page on Github. You should see your file there.

Exercise 4

Bob, on your computer:

• Clone (don't fork) your pair partner's 'introductions' repository
• Open the index.html file in your browser/Live Server to check it works
• Add a new html element to 'index.html' saying hello back
• Stage, commit and push your changes

Check back on that repository page — do you see your new changes on Github?

Exercise 5

Bob, on your computer:

• Open the repository on Github and find the list of commits
• You should see two commits with your photos
• You should be able to click the photos and see your Github profile

Here is an example of how it should be:

Exercise 6

Both, on your respective computers:

• Set up your global git config to use:
  • Your real name
  • The email address you use with GitHub

Here is how you check it is set up correctly:

$ git config --global --get-regexp "user"
user.name edward
user.email edward@boolean.co.uk

Exercise 7

Using git involves learning a lot of strange commands with weird names.

How can we learn about commands like this? List some techniques:

Getting good at finding out information like this will help you become a better software engineer. Each additional technique you learn might save you days or weeks of time in the long run.

EXTENSION (Optional)

This one will require some research on your part. Don't worry if you don't complete it, this is an opportunity to practice looking things up and experimenting!

Imagine it is a fresh new day, and you have a new person to pair with: Ada Lovelace.

We want to pick up from where we left off, but without interfering with Alice's repository. To do this, we create a new repository with the same code.

Either one of you, on your computer:

• Create a new repository on Github called 'introductions-2'
• Change your local repository remote to point to your new 'introductions-2' repository
• Write a new introduction to Ada
• Stage, commit and push your changes

Ada's introduction should now be on Github!