Day 9: Deep Dive in Git & GitHub for DevOps Engineers

Let's start

Git is a distributed version control system that allows you to track changes in your code and collaborate with other developers.

GitHub is a cloud-based platform that hosts Git repositories and provides various features such as issue tracking, code review, project management, and more.

Git and GitHub are essential for DevOps because they enable you to:

- Manage your codebase efficiently and securely - Implement continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines - Automate testing and deployment processes - Collaborate with other developers and stakeholders - Contribute to open-source projects and communities

In this article, we will cover the following topics:

- Difference between main branch and master branch? - How to create a new repository on GitHub? - What is the difference between local and remote repository? How to connect local repository to remote repository?

Difference between main branch and master branch

In Git, a branch is a pointer to a specific commit in the history of your project. You can create multiple branches to work on different features or bug fixes without affecting the main codebase.

The default branch of a Git repository is the one that is checked out when you clone the repository. It is also the one that receives new commits from other branches when you merge or rebase them.

Traditionally, the default branch of a Git repository was called master. However, in October 2020, GitHub announced that it would change the name of the default branch from master to main for all new repositories created on its platform. This was done to avoid any negative associations with the term master and to promote more inclusive language.

If you have an existing repository on GitHub that uses master as the default branch, you can rename it to main by following these steps:

1. Go to your repository on GitHub and click on the Settings tab.
2. Under Repository name, click on Rename default branch.
3. Enter main as the new branch name and click on Rename branch.
4. Update your local clone of the repository by running these commands in your terminal:

git fetch origin
git branch -u origin/main main
git remote set-head origin -a        

You can also use the following command to rename a branch locally.

git branch -m        

How to create a new repository on GitHub

A repository is a collection of files and folders that are tracked by Git. You can create a new repository on GitHub by following these steps:

1. Go to https://github.com/ and sign in with your account.
2. Click on the New button in the upper-right corner.
3. Enter a name for your repository, such as DevOps.
4. Optionally, you can add a description, choose a license, initialize the repository with a README file, or add a .gitignore file.
5. Click on Create repository.

You will see a page with some instructions on how to clone your repository or push an existing one.

What is the difference between local and remote repositories? How to connect the local repository to the remote repository?

A local repository is a copy of your project files and history that resides on your computer. A remote repository is a copy of your project files and history that resides on another server, such as GitHub.

You can connect your local repository to a remote repository by adding it as a remote. A remote is a reference to another repository that you can fetch from or push to.

To add a remote, you need to know its URL, which you can find on GitHub by clicking on the Code button in your repository page. For example, the URL of this repository is mosad2/DevOps- (github.com)

To add this remote, run this command in your terminal:

git remote add origin [email protected]:mosad2/DevOps-.git        

This will create a remote named origin that points to the URL you specified. You can use any name you want for the remote, but origin is a common convention.

To verify that you have added the remote correctly, run this command:

git remote -v        

This will show you the list of remotes and their URLs.

To fetch data from the remote, run this command:

git fetch origin        

This will download any new commits or branches from the remote to your local repository.

To push data to the remote, run this command:

git push origin main        

This will upload any new commits or branches from your local repository to the remote. You need to specify the name of the branch you want to push, such as main.

Tasks for Day 9

Now that we have learned some of the basics of Git and GitHub, let’s try to apply them in some tasks. Here are the tasks for Day 9:

1. Set your user name and user email which will be associated with the commits
2. a. Create a repository named “DevOps” on GitHub b. Connect your local repository to the repository on GitHub. c. Create a new file in Devops/Git/Day-02.txt & add some content to it d. Push your local commits to the repository on GitHub

Task 1: Set your user name and user email which will be associated with the commits

Before you start making any commits, you need to configure your user name and user email in Git. These are the information that will be attached to your commits and will identify you as the author.

To set your user name and user email, run these commands in your terminal:

git config - global user.name "Your Name"
git config - global user.email "[email protected]"        

Replace Your Name and [email protected] with your own name and email.

You can check your settings by running these commands:

git config --global user.name
git config --global user.email        

These will show you the current values of your user name and user email.

Task 2a: Create a repository named “DevOps” on GitHub

We have already seen how to create a new repository on GitHub in the previous section, so we will skip this step here. Just make sure you name your repository DevOps and copy its URL.

Task 2b: Connect your local repository to the repository on GitHub

We have also seen how to connect your local repository to a remote repository on GitHub in the previous section, so we will skip this step here. Just make sure you add the remote named origin with the URL of your DevOps repository.

Task 2c: Create a new file in Devops/Git/Day-02.txt & add some content to it

To create a new file in your local repository, you can use any text editor or IDE of your choice, or you can use the touch command in your terminal.

For example, to create a file named Day-02.txt in the folder Devops/Git, run this command:

touch Devops/Git/Day-02.txt        

This will create an empty file in the specified location.

To add some content to the file, you can use any text editor or IDE of your choice, or you can use the echo command in your terminal.

For example, to add some text to the file, run this command:

echo "hello world from day 2 of git " > Devops/Git/Day-02.txt        

Task 2d: Push your local commits to the repository on GitHub

To push your local changes to the remote repository on GitHub, you need to first stage and commit them.

Staging is the process of selecting which files or changes you want to include in a commit. A commit is a snapshot of your project at a certain point in time.

To stage all the files or changes in your local repository, run this command:

git add .        

This will add all the files or changes to the staging area.

To commit them with a message describing what you did, run this command:

git commit -m "Added Day-02.txt file"        

This will create a new commit with the message you specified.

To push them to the remote repository on GitHub, run this command:

git push origin main        

This will upload your new commit and branch to the remote repository on GitHub.

You can verify that your changes are reflected on GitHub by visiting your repository page and clicking on Commits or Code.

thanks for reading and i hope this article will be useful for you <3

#Mosad-Rashad <3