Git Basics — Part 2: Remote Git and GitHub

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This part covers working with remote repositories on GitHub: pushing, pulling, cloning, the pull request workflow, and resolving merge conflicts.

Working with remotes (GitHub)

A remote is a copy of your repo on a server. GitHub is the most popular host.

# Add a remote (usually done once):
git remote add origin https://github.com/username/repo-name.git

# Push your code to GitHub:
git push origin main

# After the first push, you can just use:
git push

# Download changes from GitHub:
git pull

# See your remotes:
git remote -v

The GitHub workflow

1. Fork the repo on GitHub (creates your own copy)
2. Clone your fork locally: git clone <your-fork-url>
3. Create a branch: git switch -c my-feature
4. Make changes, commit them
5. Push the branch: git push origin my-feature
6. Open a Pull Request on GitHub to propose your changes

Resolving merge conflicts

When two branches change the same line, git cannot merge automatically. It marks the conflict:

<<<<<<< HEAD
def greet(name):
    return f"Hello, {name}!"
=======
def greet(name):
    return f"Hi there, {name}!"
>>>>>>> feature-branch

To resolve: 1. Open the file and choose which version to keep (or combine them) 2. Remove the <<<<<<<, =======, and >>>>>>> markers 3. Stage and commit the fix:

git add filename.py
git commit -m "Resolve merge conflict in greet function"

Common Mistakes

Committing too much at once: Each commit should be one logical change. "Add login form" is good. "Add login form, fix CSS, update README, refactor utils" is too much — make separate commits.

Writing bad commit messages:

# BAD:
git commit -m "fix"
git commit -m "stuff"
git commit -m "asdfg"

# GOOD:
git commit -m "Fix off-by-one error in pagination"
git commit -m "Add password validation to signup form"

Committing secrets:

# NEVER do this:
git add .env              # Contains API keys and passwords!
git add credentials.json  # Contains service account keys!

Add these to .gitignore BEFORE your first commit. If you accidentally commit secrets, they are in the history forever (even if you delete the file later). You must rotate (change) the exposed credentials.

Forgetting to pull before pushing:

git push    # Rejected! Remote has changes you do not have.
git pull    # Download remote changes first
git push    # Now it works

Remote commands cheat sheet

Command	What it does
git clone <url>	Download a repo
git remote add origin <url>	Link to a remote
git push	Upload commits to remote
git pull	Download commits from remote
git remote -v	Show remote URLs
git push origin <branch>	Push a specific branch

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← Part 1: Local Git	Overview