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|--orphan] <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--orphan:: 94 Create a new 'orphan' branch, named <new_branch>, started from 95 <start_point> and switch to it. The first commit made on this 96 new branch will have no parents and it will be the root of a new 97 history totally disconnected from all the other branches and 98 commits. 99+ 100The index and the working tree are adjusted as if you had previously run 101"git checkout <start_point>". This allows you to start a new history 102that records a set of paths similar to <start_point> by easily running 103"git commit -a" to make the root commit. 104+ 105This can be useful when you want to publish the tree from a commit 106without exposing its full history. You might want to do this to publish 107an open source branch of a project whose current tree is "clean", but 108whose full history contains proprietary or otherwise encumbered bits of 109code. 110+ 111If you want to start a disconnected history that records a set of paths 112that is totally different from the one of <start_point>, then you should 113clear the index and the working tree right after creating the orphan 114branch by running "git rm -rf ." from the top level of the working tree. 115Afterwards you will be ready to prepare your new files, repopulating the 116working tree, by copying them from elsewhere, extracting a tarball, etc. 117 118-m:: 119--merge:: 120 When switching branches, 121 if you have local modifications to one or more files that 122 are different between the current branch and the branch to 123 which you are switching, the command refuses to switch 124 branches in order to preserve your modifications in context. 125 However, with this option, a three-way merge between the current 126 branch, your working tree contents, and the new branch 127 is done, and you will be on the new branch. 128+ 129When a merge conflict happens, the index entries for conflicting 130paths are left unmerged, and you need to resolve the conflicts 131and mark the resolved paths with `git add` (or `git rm` if the merge 132should result in deletion of the path). 133+ 134When checking out paths from the index, this option lets you recreate 135the conflicted merge in the specified paths. 136 137--conflict=<style>:: 138 The same as --merge option above, but changes the way the 139 conflicting hunks are presented, overriding the 140 merge.conflictstyle configuration variable. Possible values are 141 "merge" (default) and "diff3" (in addition to what is shown by 142 "merge" style, shows the original contents). 143 144-p:: 145--patch:: 146 Interactively select hunks in the difference between the 147 <tree-ish> (or the index, if unspecified) and the working 148 tree. The chosen hunks are then applied in reverse to the 149 working tree (and if a <tree-ish> was specified, the index). 150+ 151This means that you can use `git checkout -p` to selectively discard 152edits from your current working tree. 153 154<branch>:: 155 Branch to checkout; if it refers to a branch (i.e., a name that, 156 when prepended with "refs/heads/", is a valid ref), then that 157 branch is checked out. Otherwise, if it refers to a valid 158 commit, your HEAD becomes "detached" and you are no longer on 159 any branch (see below for details). 160+ 161As a special case, the `"@\{-N\}"` syntax for the N-th last branch 162checks out the branch (instead of detaching). You may also specify 163`-` which is synonymous with `"@\{-1\}"`. 164 165<new_branch>:: 166 Name for the new branch. 167 168<start_point>:: 169 The name of a commit at which to start the new branch; see 170 linkgit:git-branch[1] for details. Defaults to HEAD. 171 172<tree-ish>:: 173 Tree to checkout from (when paths are given). If not specified, 174 the index will be used. 175 176 177 178Detached HEAD 179------------- 180 181It is sometimes useful to be able to 'checkout' a commit that is 182not at the tip of one of your branches. The most obvious 183example is to check out the commit at a tagged official release 184point, like this: 185 186------------ 187$ git checkout v2.6.18 188------------ 189 190Earlier versions of git did not allow this and asked you to 191create a temporary branch using the `-b` option, but starting from 192version 1.5.0, the above command 'detaches' your HEAD from the 193current branch and directly points at the commit named by the tag 194(`v2.6.18` in the example above). 195 196You can use all git commands while in this state. You can use 197`git reset --hard $othercommit` to further move around, for 198example. You can make changes and create a new commit on top of 199a detached HEAD. You can even create a merge by using `git 200merge $othercommit`. 201 202The state you are in while your HEAD is detached is not recorded 203by any branch (which is natural --- you are not on any branch). 204What this means is that you can discard your temporary commits 205and merges by switching back to an existing branch (e.g. `git 206checkout master`), and a later `git prune` or `git gc` would 207garbage-collect them. If you did this by mistake, you can ask 208the reflog for HEAD where you were, e.g. 209 210------------ 211$ git log -g -2 HEAD 212------------ 213 214 215EXAMPLES 216-------- 217 218. The following sequence checks out the `master` branch, reverts 219the `Makefile` to two revisions back, deletes hello.c by 220mistake, and gets it back from the index. 221+ 222------------ 223$ git checkout master <1> 224$ git checkout master~2 Makefile <2> 225$ rm -f hello.c 226$ git checkout hello.c <3> 227------------ 228+ 229<1> switch branch 230<2> take a file out of another commit 231<3> restore hello.c from the index 232+ 233If you have an unfortunate branch that is named `hello.c`, this 234step would be confused as an instruction to switch to that branch. 235You should instead write: 236+ 237------------ 238$ git checkout -- hello.c 239------------ 240 241. After working in the wrong branch, switching to the correct 242branch would be done using: 243+ 244------------ 245$ git checkout mytopic 246------------ 247+ 248However, your "wrong" branch and correct "mytopic" branch may 249differ in files that you have modified locally, in which case 250the above checkout would fail like this: 251+ 252------------ 253$ git checkout mytopic 254fatal: Entry 'frotz' not uptodate. Cannot merge. 255------------ 256+ 257You can give the `-m` flag to the command, which would try a 258three-way merge: 259+ 260------------ 261$ git checkout -m mytopic 262Auto-merging frotz 263------------ 264+ 265After this three-way merge, the local modifications are _not_ 266registered in your index file, so `git diff` would show you what 267changes you made since the tip of the new branch. 268 269. When a merge conflict happens during switching branches with 270the `-m` option, you would see something like this: 271+ 272------------ 273$ git checkout -m mytopic 274Auto-merging frotz 275ERROR: Merge conflict in frotz 276fatal: merge program failed 277------------ 278+ 279At this point, `git diff` shows the changes cleanly merged as in 280the previous example, as well as the changes in the conflicted 281files. Edit and resolve the conflict and mark it resolved with 282`git add` as usual: 283+ 284------------ 285$ edit frotz 286$ git add frotz 287------------ 288 289 290Author 291------ 292Written by Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org> 293 294Documentation 295-------------- 296Documentation by Junio C Hamano and the git-list <git@vger.kernel.org>. 297 298GIT 299--- 300Part of the linkgit:git[1] suite