Remote
A remote is a repository in a different place (usually online)
Git provides the tools to keep
local and remote repositories synchronized with each other
Manage a shared project
Usually we rely on hosting platforms to be a common repository between local ones
Even if possible, the direct synchronization betweentwo personal computers is not generally used
Example of a topology with hosting platforms
How to tell git of the existence of remotes
Before being able to synchronize a repository, we need to tell git were is the remote one
This can be done with the remote command
git remote add <ref_name> <url_to_repo>The subcommand add allows to create a new reference to a remote repository
git supports https, ssh or pathgit remote add origin https://gitlab.org/path/repository.gitWhat has changed?
git remote -vorigin https://gitlab.org/path/repository.git (fetch)
origin https://gitlab.org/path/repository.git (push)Two references to a remote repository (which I called "origin") were created:
- one to send commits (push)
- and one to receive commits (fetch)
refs on the remote
Every ref on the remote is different from the local one
The remote refs will be called <remote_name>/ref_name
If the remote is called origin, the main branch will be:
- main for the local branch
- origin/main for the remote one
git pull <remote_ref_name> <ref>The pull command tries to retrive a ref (and associated commits) from a remote and merge them to the local history
git pull origin mastergit tries to download the commits of branch master
from the remote repository called origin,
and then tries to merge them with the local history.
If there is any merge conflict it needs to be solved as usual
How to "sync" to a remote repository?
git push <remote_ref_name> <ref>The push command takes a reference to a remote and a reference to a commit, then it sends the referenced commit to the remote, with all the commit it depends on
git push origin mastergit sends the commits which the branch master depends on
to the remote repository called origin,
which then tries to merge them to its history.
If that merge would result in a conflict, the remote will refuse the commits
You will have to to first pull and solve the conflict locally
How to download an existing repo for the first time
We can do it with the previous commands
mkdir <repo_name>
cd <repo_name>
git init
git remote add origin <repo_uri>
git pull...or, we can also use the clone command
git clone <repo_uri>