1git-checkout(1) 2=============== 3 4NAME 5---- 6git-checkout - Checkout a branch or paths to the working tree 7 8SYNOPSIS 9-------- 10[verse] 11'git checkout' [-q] [-f] [-m] [<branch>] 12'git checkout' [-q] [-f] [-m] [-b <new_branch>] [<start_point>] 13'git checkout' [-f|--ours|--theirs|-m|--conflict=<style>] [<tree-ish>] [--] <paths>... 14'git checkout' --patch [<tree-ish>] [--] [<paths>...] 15 16DESCRIPTION 17----------- 18 19When <paths> are not given, this command switches branches by 20updating the index, working tree, and HEAD to reflect the specified 21branch. 22 23If `-b` is given, a new branch is created and checked out, as if 24linkgit:git-branch[1] were called; in this case you can 25use the --track or --no-track options, which will be passed to `git 26branch`. As a convenience, --track without `-b` implies branch 27creation; see the description of --track below. 28 29When <paths> or --patch are given, this command does *not* switch 30branches. It updates the named paths in the working tree from 31the index file, or from a named <tree-ish> (most often a commit). In 32this case, the `-b` and `--track` options are meaningless and giving 33either of them results in an error. The <tree-ish> argument can be 34used to specify a specific tree-ish (i.e. commit, tag or tree) 35to update the index for the given paths before updating the 36working tree. 37 38The index may contain unmerged entries after a failed merge. By 39default, if you try to check out such an entry from the index, the 40checkout operation will fail and nothing will be checked out. 41Using -f will ignore these unmerged entries. The contents from a 42specific side of the merge can be checked out of the index by 43using --ours or --theirs. With -m, changes made to the working tree 44file can be discarded to recreate the original conflicted merge result. 45 46OPTIONS 47------- 48-q:: 49--quiet:: 50 Quiet, suppress feedback messages. 51 52-f:: 53--force:: 54 When switching branches, proceed even if the index or the 55 working tree differs from HEAD. This is used to throw away 56 local changes. 57+ 58When checking out paths from the index, do not fail upon unmerged 59entries; instead, unmerged entries are ignored. 60 61--ours:: 62--theirs:: 63 When checking out paths from the index, check out stage #2 64 ('ours') or #3 ('theirs') for unmerged paths. 65 66-b:: 67 Create a new branch named <new_branch> and start it at 68 <start_point>; see linkgit:git-branch[1] for details. 69 70-t:: 71--track:: 72 When creating a new branch, set up "upstream" configuration. See 73 "--track" in linkgit:git-branch[1] for details. 74+ 75If no '-b' option is given, the name of the new branch will be 76derived from the remote branch. If "remotes/" or "refs/remotes/" 77is prefixed it is stripped away, and then the part up to the 78next slash (which would be the nickname of the remote) is removed. 79This would tell us to use "hack" as the local branch when branching 80off of "origin/hack" (or "remotes/origin/hack", or even 81"refs/remotes/origin/hack"). If the given name has no slash, or the above 82guessing results in an empty name, the guessing is aborted. You can 83explicitly give a name with '-b' in such a case. 84 85--no-track:: 86 Do not set up "upstream" configuration, even if the 87 branch.autosetupmerge configuration variable is true. 88 89-l:: 90 Create the new branch's reflog; see linkgit:git-branch[1] for 91 details. 92 93-m:: 94--merge:: 95 When switching branches, 96 if you have local modifications to one or more files that 97 are different between the current branch and the branch to 98 which you are switching, the command refuses to switch 99 branches in order to preserve your modifications in context. 100 However, with this option, a three-way merge between the current 101 branch, your working tree contents, and the new branch 102 is done, and you will be on the new branch. 103+ 104When a merge conflict happens, the index entries for conflicting 105paths are left unmerged, and you need to resolve the conflicts 106and mark the resolved paths with `git add` (or `git rm` if the merge 107should result in deletion of the path). 108+ 109When checking out paths from the index, this option lets you recreate 110the conflicted merge in the specified paths. 111 112--conflict=<style>:: 113 The same as --merge option above, but changes the way the 114 conflicting hunks are presented, overriding the 115 merge.conflictstyle configuration variable. Possible values are 116 "merge" (default) and "diff3" (in addition to what is shown by 117 "merge" style, shows the original contents). 118 119-p:: 120--patch:: 121 Interactively select hunks in the difference between the 122 <tree-ish> (or the index, if unspecified) and the working 123 tree. The chosen hunks are then applied in reverse to the 124 working tree (and if a <tree-ish> was specified, the index). 125+ 126This means that you can use `git checkout -p` to selectively discard 127edits from your current working tree. 128 129<branch>:: 130 Branch to checkout; if it refers to a branch (i.e., a name that, 131 when prepended with "refs/heads/", is a valid ref), then that 132 branch is checked out. Otherwise, if it refers to a valid 133 commit, your HEAD becomes "detached" and you are no longer on 134 any branch (see below for details). 135+ 136As a special case, the `"@\{-N\}"` syntax for the N-th last branch 137checks out the branch (instead of detaching). You may also specify 138`-` which is synonymous with `"@\{-1\}"`. 139+ 140As a further special case, you may use `"A...B"` as a shortcut for the 141merge base of `A` and `B` if there is exactly one merge base. You can 142leave out at most one of `A` and `B`, in which case it defaults to `HEAD`. 143 144<new_branch>:: 145 Name for the new branch. 146 147<start_point>:: 148 The name of a commit at which to start the new branch; see 149 linkgit:git-branch[1] for details. Defaults to HEAD. 150 151<tree-ish>:: 152 Tree to checkout from (when paths are given). If not specified, 153 the index will be used. 154 155 156 157Detached HEAD 158------------- 159 160It is sometimes useful to be able to 'checkout' a commit that is 161not at the tip of one of your branches. The most obvious 162example is to check out the commit at a tagged official release 163point, like this: 164 165------------ 166$ git checkout v2.6.18 167------------ 168 169Earlier versions of git did not allow this and asked you to 170create a temporary branch using the `-b` option, but starting from 171version 1.5.0, the above command 'detaches' your HEAD from the 172current branch and directly points at the commit named by the tag 173(`v2.6.18` in the example above). 174 175You can use all git commands while in this state. You can use 176`git reset --hard $othercommit` to further move around, for 177example. You can make changes and create a new commit on top of 178a detached HEAD. You can even create a merge by using `git 179merge $othercommit`. 180 181The state you are in while your HEAD is detached is not recorded 182by any branch (which is natural --- you are not on any branch). 183What this means is that you can discard your temporary commits 184and merges by switching back to an existing branch (e.g. `git 185checkout master`), and a later `git prune` or `git gc` would 186garbage-collect them. If you did this by mistake, you can ask 187the reflog for HEAD where you were, e.g. 188 189------------ 190$ git log -g -2 HEAD 191------------ 192 193 194EXAMPLES 195-------- 196 197. The following sequence checks out the `master` branch, reverts 198the `Makefile` to two revisions back, deletes hello.c by 199mistake, and gets it back from the index. 200+ 201------------ 202$ git checkout master <1> 203$ git checkout master~2 Makefile <2> 204$ rm -f hello.c 205$ git checkout hello.c <3> 206------------ 207+ 208<1> switch branch 209<2> take a file out of another commit 210<3> restore hello.c from the index 211+ 212If you have an unfortunate branch that is named `hello.c`, this 213step would be confused as an instruction to switch to that branch. 214You should instead write: 215+ 216------------ 217$ git checkout -- hello.c 218------------ 219 220. After working in the wrong branch, switching to the correct 221branch would be done using: 222+ 223------------ 224$ git checkout mytopic 225------------ 226+ 227However, your "wrong" branch and correct "mytopic" branch may 228differ in files that you have modified locally, in which case 229the above checkout would fail like this: 230+ 231------------ 232$ git checkout mytopic 233fatal: Entry 'frotz' not uptodate. Cannot merge. 234------------ 235+ 236You can give the `-m` flag to the command, which would try a 237three-way merge: 238+ 239------------ 240$ git checkout -m mytopic 241Auto-merging frotz 242------------ 243+ 244After this three-way merge, the local modifications are _not_ 245registered in your index file, so `git diff` would show you what 246changes you made since the tip of the new branch. 247 248. When a merge conflict happens during switching branches with 249the `-m` option, you would see something like this: 250+ 251------------ 252$ git checkout -m mytopic 253Auto-merging frotz 254ERROR: Merge conflict in frotz 255fatal: merge program failed 256------------ 257+ 258At this point, `git diff` shows the changes cleanly merged as in 259the previous example, as well as the changes in the conflicted 260files. Edit and resolve the conflict and mark it resolved with 261`git add` as usual: 262+ 263------------ 264$ edit frotz 265$ git add frotz 266------------ 267 268 269Author 270------ 271Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org> 272 273Documentation 274-------------- 275Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org>. 276 277GIT 278--- 279Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite