1git-checkout(1) 2=============== 3 4NAME 5---- 6git-checkout - Checkout and switch to a branch 7 8SYNOPSIS 9-------- 10[verse] 11'git-checkout' [-q] [-f] [-b [--track | --no-track] <new_branch> [-l]] [-m] [<branch>] 12'git-checkout' [<tree-ish>] <paths>... 13 14DESCRIPTION 15----------- 16 17When <paths> are not given, this command switches branches by 18updating the index and working tree to reflect the specified 19branch, <branch>, and updating HEAD to be <branch> or, if 20specified, <new_branch>. Using -b will cause <new_branch> to 21be created; in this case you can use the --track or --no-track 22options, which will be passed to `git branch`. 23 24When <paths> are given, this command does *not* switch 25branches. It updates the named paths in the working tree from 26the index file (i.e. it runs `git-checkout-index -f -u`), or a 27named commit. In 28this case, `-f` and `-b` options are meaningless and giving 29either of them results in an error. <tree-ish> argument can be 30used to specify a specific tree-ish (i.e. commit, tag or tree) 31to update the index for the given paths before updating the 32working tree. 33 34 35OPTIONS 36------- 37-q:: 38 Quiet, supress feedback messages. 39 40-f:: 41 Force a re-read of everything. 42 43-b:: 44 Create a new branch named <new_branch> and start it at 45 <branch>. The new branch name must pass all checks defined 46 by gitlink:git-check-ref-format[1]. Some of these checks 47 may restrict the characters allowed in a branch name. 48 49--track:: 50 When -b is given and a branch is created off a remote branch, 51 setup so that git-pull will automatically retrieve data from 52 the remote branch. 53 54--no-track:: 55 When -b is given and a branch is created off a remote branch, 56 force that git-pull will automatically retrieve data from 57 the remote branch independent of the configuration settings. 58 59-l:: 60 Create the new branch's ref log. This activates recording of 61 all changes to made the branch ref, enabling use of date 62 based sha1 expressions such as "<branchname>@{yesterday}". 63 64-m:: 65 If you have local modifications to one or more files that 66 are different between the current branch and the branch to 67 which you are switching, the command refuses to switch 68 branches in order to preserve your modifications in context. 69 However, with this option, a three-way merge between the current 70 branch, your working tree contents, and the new branch 71 is done, and you will be on the new branch. 72+ 73When a merge conflict happens, the index entries for conflicting 74paths are left unmerged, and you need to resolve the conflicts 75and mark the resolved paths with `git add` (or `git rm` if the merge 76should result in deletion of the path). 77 78<new_branch>:: 79 Name for the new branch. 80 81<branch>:: 82 Branch to checkout; may be any object ID that resolves to a 83 commit. Defaults to HEAD. 84+ 85When this parameter names a non-branch (but still a valid commit object), 86your HEAD becomes 'detached'. 87 88 89Detached HEAD 90------------- 91 92It is sometimes useful to be able to 'checkout' a commit that is 93not at the tip of one of your branches. The most obvious 94example is to check out the commit at a tagged official release 95point, like this: 96 97------------ 98$ git checkout v2.6.18 99------------ 100 101Earlier versions of git did not allow this and asked you to 102create a temporary branch using `-b` option, but starting from 103version 1.5.0, the above command 'detaches' your HEAD from the 104current branch and directly point at the commit named by the tag 105(`v2.6.18` in the above example). 106 107You can use usual git commands while in this state. You can use 108`git-reset --hard $othercommit` to further move around, for 109example. You can make changes and create a new commit on top of 110a detached HEAD. You can even create a merge by using `git 111merge $othercommit`. 112 113The state you are in while your HEAD is detached is not recorded 114by any branch (which is natural --- you are not on any branch). 115What this means is that you can discard your temporary commits 116and merges by switching back to an existing branch (e.g. `git 117checkout master`), and a later `git prune` or `git gc` would 118garbage-collect them. If you did this by mistake, you can ask 119the reflog for HEAD where you were, e.g. 120 121------------ 122$ git log -g -2 HEAD 123------------ 124 125 126EXAMPLES 127-------- 128 129. The following sequence checks out the `master` branch, reverts 130the `Makefile` to two revisions back, deletes hello.c by 131mistake, and gets it back from the index. 132+ 133------------ 134$ git checkout master <1> 135$ git checkout master~2 Makefile <2> 136$ rm -f hello.c 137$ git checkout hello.c <3> 138------------ 139+ 140<1> switch branch 141<2> take out a file out of other commit 142<3> restore hello.c from HEAD of current branch 143+ 144If you have an unfortunate branch that is named `hello.c`, this 145step would be confused as an instruction to switch to that branch. 146You should instead write: 147+ 148------------ 149$ git checkout -- hello.c 150------------ 151 152. After working in a wrong branch, switching to the correct 153branch would be done using: 154+ 155------------ 156$ git checkout mytopic 157------------ 158+ 159However, your "wrong" branch and correct "mytopic" branch may 160differ in files that you have locally modified, in which case, 161the above checkout would fail like this: 162+ 163------------ 164$ git checkout mytopic 165fatal: Entry 'frotz' not uptodate. Cannot merge. 166------------ 167+ 168You can give the `-m` flag to the command, which would try a 169three-way merge: 170+ 171------------ 172$ git checkout -m mytopic 173Auto-merging frotz 174------------ 175+ 176After this three-way merge, the local modifications are _not_ 177registered in your index file, so `git diff` would show you what 178changes you made since the tip of the new branch. 179 180. When a merge conflict happens during switching branches with 181the `-m` option, you would see something like this: 182+ 183------------ 184$ git checkout -m mytopic 185Auto-merging frotz 186merge: warning: conflicts during merge 187ERROR: Merge conflict in frotz 188fatal: merge program failed 189------------ 190+ 191At this point, `git diff` shows the changes cleanly merged as in 192the previous example, as well as the changes in the conflicted 193files. Edit and resolve the conflict and mark it resolved with 194`git add` as usual: 195+ 196------------ 197$ edit frotz 198$ git add frotz 199------------ 200 201 202Author 203------ 204Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org> 205 206Documentation 207-------------- 208Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org>. 209 210GIT 211--- 212Part of the gitlink:git[7] suite 213