I have a CMS theme installed on my machine. I'm tracking changes to it via git
and decided to back it up on GitHub so I could share those changes.
The theme as provided is also available on GitHub. On my machine I have added
this as a remote upstream. Now I can easily see the changes between my master
and the remote upstream by using the following command:
git diff --color master upstream/number
If I could add the remote upstream on GitHub I could easily share these changes.
Is it possible to set this relationship on GitHub?
I have tried the following:
git push -u origin upstreambranch
which adds an upstreambranch to the master on GitHub. However trying to
compare both branches doesn't work, the result I get on GitHub is that: "There
isn't anything to compare"
Is there an alternative way to compare these?
If the problem is "main and master are entirely different commit histories.", the following will work
git checkout master
git branch main master -f
git checkout main
git push origin main -f
The Short Answer
It looks like GitHub won't let you compare the branches because they don't
actually share any of the same history at all, even though they may share
much of the same files and code.
Here is a screenshot of the temporary fork I made of your repo, where I tried to
compare master with the upstreambranch, like you described. Notice the error
message:
It says:
There isn't anything to compare.
master and upstreambranch are entirely different commit histories.
The Long Answer
You probably downloaded the original source and added it to a completely new
repo instead of cloning the original repo, right? Doing that will make it so
that the history of your repo will be completely different from the
history of the original repo, since your new repo won't have any of the same
commits with the same sha IDs.
You can see that by doing a reverse log of your master branch and the
upstreambranch:
# Your first commit, see commit sha
git log --reverse master
commit c548d7b1b16b0350d7fbdb3ff1cfedcb38051397 # <== HERE
Author: Padraic Stack <padraic.stack#nuim.ie>
Date: Wed Apr 2 15:11:28 2014 +0100
First commit of everything
# First commit sha of the original repo
git log --reverse upstreambranch
commit 105a12817234033c45b4dc7522ff3103f473a862 # <== THERE
Author: Jeremy Boggs <jeremy#clioweb.org>
Date: Mon Feb 22 16:00:53 2010 +0000
Creates repo directories for the Seasons theme.
Solutions
If you redo your commits on top of the original history, you should then be able
to compare the branches. There are several different ways that you can redo your
commits, including
git rebase --onto
and
git cherry-pick
You also can redo each commit manually, if you have to.
I had a similar situation, where my master branch and the develop branch I was trying to merge had different commit histories. None of the above solutions worked for me. What did the trick was:
Starting from master:
git branch new_branch
git checkout new_branch
git merge develop --allow-unrelated-histories
Now in the new_branch, there are all the things from develop and I can easily merge into master, or create a pull request, as they now share the same commit hisotry.
I solve my issue using these commands
git checkout [BRANCH]
git branch master [BRANCH] -f
git checkout master
git push origin master -f
You can force update your master branch as follows:
git checkout upstreambranch
git branch master upstreambranch -f
git checkout master
git push origin master -f
For the ones who have problem to merge into main branch (Which is the new default one in Github) you can use the following:
git checkout master
git branch main master -f
git checkout main
git push origin main -f
The following command will force both branches to have the same history:
git branch [Branch1] [Branch2] -f
From the experiment branch
git rebase master
git push -f origin <experiment-branch>
This creates a common commit history to be able to compare both branches.
This looks like undesirable behavior on github's part, but it's fairly easy to fix. What you want to do is to rebase your branch on a reasonable (any reasonable) commit in the existing history. What you can do is to fetch the github repo and find which tree in its history is most similar to the one you started with. Start this way:
git remote add github u://r/l
git fetch github
myroot=`git rev-list master --max-parents=0`
root_tree=`git rev-parse $myroot^{tree}`
github_base=`git log --pretty=%H\ %T github/master | sed -n "s/$root_tree//p"`
With any luck, that will find you a commit in the github history that has the exact tree you started with. Assuming it does,
git rebase --onto $github_base $myroot master
and you're done.
If that doesn't find a matching tree, you get to find a nearest approximation. Here's one way to get a rough estimate of the differences:
git log --pretty='echo %H $(git diff-tree -p -b -U0 '$myroot:' %T|wc -l)' github/master \
| sh
which will count the lines in a minimized diff between the tree of each commit in the github/master history and your root tree. It seems reasonable to hope for a nice small difference, you could eyeball the actual diffs on it before calling that the github_base commit and doing the rebase above.
Terminology
First, let's get some terminology out of the way...
upstream <= The remote git repo (likely whose master or release branch is in production)
forked-repo <= The remote [experimental git repo] (https://docs.github.com/en/github/getting-started-with-github/fork-a-repo) also known as "origin".
local repo <= The files and directories that you work with on your local workstaion, which you likely got by running a git clone my-forked-repo.git command
local index <= Also known as your local git "stage", i.e., where you stage your files before pushing them to you remote repo.
Github workflow process
Next, let's talk about the process of getting your changes to the upstream repo:
The process is generally to work on a feature branch and then push said branch, and open a Pull Request, either to your forked-repo's master branch or to the upstream's master branch
Create a feature branch by running git checkout -b FEATURE_BRANCH_NAME
Add/delete/modify files project files.
Add files by running git add .
Commit your files to your index by running git commit -m'My commit message'
Push your staged files by running git push origin FEATURE_BRANCH_NAME
Solution for entirely different commit histories
The master and upstreambranch are entirely different commit histories message can occur when you've forked a git repository and have changed your git history.
For example, if you fork a repo and pull your forked repo to work on it locally...
If then you decide to rewrite the entire application and then decide it's a good idea to deleting all existing files, including the forked-repo's .git directory. You add new files and directories to recreate your app and also recreate your .git directory with git init command.
Now, your application works great with your new files and you want to get it merged into the upstream repo. However, when you push your changes you get that "...entirely different commit histories..." error message.
You'll see that your original git commit will be different in your new local directory and if in your remote fork (as well as your upstream). Check this out by running this command in your current directory: git log --reverse master. Then running the following: pushd $(mktemp -d); git clone https://github.com/my-forking-username/my-forked-repo.git; git log --reverse master; popd
You must fix your local .git repo to match your remote my-forked-repo if you want to push your commits and subsequently perform a pull request (in hopes of merging your new updates to the upstream/master branch).
git clone https://github.com/my-forking-username/my-forked-repo.git
cd my-forked-repo
git checkout -b my-new-files-branch-name
# Delete all files and directories except for the .git directory
git add .
git commit -m'Remove old files'
# Copy your new files to this my-forked-repo directory
git add .
git commit -m'Add new files'
git push origin my-new-files-branch-name
Create a PR on GitHub and request to merge your my-new-files-branch-name branch in your my-forked-repo into master.
Note: The "...entirely different commit histories..." error message can also occur in non-forked repos for the same reasons and can be fixed with the same solution above.
A more simple approach where you can't mingle with the master.
Consider i have master and JIRA-1234 branch and when i am trying to merge JIRA-1234 to master i am getting the above issue so please follow below steps:-
From JIRA-1234 cut a branch JIRA-1234-rebase (Its a temp branch and can have any name. I have taken JIRA-1234-rebase to be meaningful.)
git checkout JIRA-1234
git checkout -b JIRA-1234-rebase
The above command will create a new branch JIRA-1234-rebase and will checkout it.
Now we will rebase our master.
git rebase master (This is executed in the same branch JIRA-1234-rebase)
You will see a window showing the commit history from first commit till the last commit on JIRA-1234-rebase. So if we have 98 commits then it will rebase them 1 by 1 and you will see something like 1/98.
Here we just need to pick the commit we want so if you want this commit then don't do anything and just HIT Esc then :q! and HIT ENTER.
There would be some changes in case of conflict and you need to resolve this conflict and then add the files by
git add <FILE_NAME>.
Now do git rebase continue it will take you to rebase 2/98 and similarly you have to go through all the 98 commits and resolve all of them and remeber we need to add the files in each commit.
Finally you can now push these commits and then raise Pull Request by
git push or git push origin JIRA-1234-rebase
This happened for me because I created a repo from GH, but then I also added a README. In doing so I created a commit on my remote.
Then I went and created a new repo locally, made some changes and committed. Then I pushed it to the šrepo and tried to make a Pull Request.
But my remote's initial commit was different from my local's commit, hence this error message. GitHub itself even warns you against this:
Create a new repository on GitHub.com. To avoid errors, do not initialize the new repository with README, license, or gitignore files. You can add these files after your project has been pushed to GitHub.
GitHub Docs
Similarly if you're creating a new repo, GitHub will quietly suggest that you skip initializing the repo. Rather just define the repo.
tldr the very first commit has to be identical, you can't merge 2 commits that don't have an identical initial commit.
If you know from which commit issue started, you can reset your branch to that commit and then merge them.
this is 100% works in any situation :
1)create new folder in your machine
2)clone the remote repository to the new folder
3)delete all files and folders except for the .git folder
4)add your project files that you are working on to this new folder you created
5)open terminal
6)cd new_folder_path (path to the new folder you created)
warning : don't type > git init
7) > git add .
8) > git commit -m "write anything"
9) > git push URL(url of the remote repository)local_branch_name:remote_branch_name
This happened with me yesterday cause I downloaded the code from original repo and try to pushed it on my forked repo, spend so much time on searching for solving "Unable to push error" and pushed it forcefully.
Solution:
Simply Refork the repo by deleting previous one and clone the repo from forked repo to the new folder.
Replace the file with old one in new folder and push it to repo and do a new pull request.
I solved that problem. In my case when i did āgit cloneā in one directory of my choice without do āgit initā inside of that repository. Then I moved in to the cloned repository, where already have a ā.gitā (is a git repository i.e. do not need a āgit initā) and finally I started do my changes or anything.
It probably doesnāt solve the problem but shows you how to avoid it.
The command git clone should be a ācdā command imbued if no submodule exists.
I got this error when initializing a GitHub repository with a README file, and then trying to push my existing local git repository to it. This resulted in a main branch with the README file, which was the Default branch, and a master branch with my code, and they couldn't be merged.
But since I didn't actually have anything important in my main branch (if you need to keep the data from both your branches, check out PaianuVlad23's Answer instead), I managed to solve the problem by changing the Default branch to the master branch, and then delete the main branch, like this:
When in GitHub, click your user icon in the top right of the window.
Choose "Your repositories", and then click your repository name.
Under the repository name, choose the tab "Settings".
From the pane on the left, choose "Branches".
Under the headline "Default", change the default branch from the one you want to delete (in my case main) to the one you want to keep (in my case master).
Now, click the tab "Code" under the repo name.
Under the tab line containing "Code" etc, you'll see a place where it says "2 branches". Click it.
Find the branch you want to delete, and click the trash bin icon on the right on that line.
Now, your repository has only one branch, which is the one you want to push your local changes to! š Just as if you hadn't initiated your repository before pushing to it, as #mfaani's answer in this thread suggests you do it.
I found that none of the answers provided actually worked for me; what actually worked for me is to do:
git push --set-upstream origin *BRANCHNAME*
After creating a new branch, then it gets tracked properly. (I have Git 2.7.4)
I don't think we have same case here, but still someone else may find it helpful.
When similar error occurred to me, it was going to be the first merge and first commit. There was nothing in on-line repository.
Therefore, there was no code on git-hub, to compare with.
I simply deleted the empty repository and created new one with same name.
And then there was no error.
I got this error message, because I was migrating an application from SVN to GitHub and it's not enough to invoke a git init in the location of the source code checked out from SVN, but you need to invoke a git svn clone in order to have all the commit history.
This way the two source codes on GitHub will have a mutual history and I was able to open pull requests.
I had an issue where I was pushing to my remote repo from a local repo that didn't match up with history of remote. This is what worked for me.
I cloned my repo locally so I knew I was working with fresh copy of repo:
git clone Your_REPO_URL_HERE.git
Switch to the branch you are trying to get into the remote:
git checkout Your_BRANCH_NAME_HERE
Add the remote of the original:
git remote add upstream Your_REMOTE_REPO_URL_HERE.git
Do a git fetch and git pull:
git fetch --all
git pull upstream Your_BRANCH_NAME_HERE
If you have merge conflicts, resolve them with
git mergetool kdiff3
or other merge tool of your choice.
Once conflicts are resolved and saved. Commit and push changes.
Now go to the gitub.com repo of the original and attempt to create a pull request. You should have option to create pull request and not see the "Nothing to compare, branches are entirely different commit histories"
Note: You may need to choose compare across forks for your pull request.
Top guy is probably right that you downloaded instead of cloning the repo at start.
Here is a easy solution without getting too technical.
In a new editor window, clone your repo in another directory.
Make a new branch.
Then copy from your your edited editor window into your new repo by copy paste.
Make sure that all your edits are copied over by looking at your older github branch.
I had mine solved by overriding the branch:
My case: I wanted to override whatever code is in the develop with version_2.
delete the local copy of conflicting branch:
git checkout version_2
git branch -D develop
checkout a fresh branch from the version_2 and force push to git:
git checkout -b `develop`
git push origin `develop`
I didn't need to rebase. But in my case, I didn't need to take code from my old code.
first: pull from remote repo
merge or rebase
finally: push to remote repo
finish
When you are pull/merging feature to main and are in the main branch in the terminal, I successfully used 'git pull origin feature --allow-unrelated-histories'.
Before using this command, I had the same message about completely different commit histories, and I think it's because I accidentally pushed to main after committing to the feature branch. Then I tried some of the solutions offered here like rebase, which allowed me to merge my code, but I still had the compare and pull notifications through git, and it was a one time fix. By one time fix I mean I still got the different commit history message the next time I tried to merge a feature branch's code to main.
Another source from a google search offered the --allow-unrelated-histories fix, and it permanently works exactly how I wanted it to. The branches were merged and now I can merge without error messages and the compare and pull notifications work through git.
I'm sure there are consequences for people who didn't have the same problem as me, but I didn't lose any code and now my repo is clean. Also, I'm also an amateur coder and the question is older so maybe this command wasn't available when the question was asked or I'm not understanding the issue correctly.
I wanted to copy commit history of "master" branch & overwrite the commit history of "main" branch .
The steps are:-
git checkout master
git branch main master -f
git checkout main
git push
To delete master branch:-
a. Locally:-
git checkout main
git branch -d master
b. Globally:-
git push origin --delete master
I have a master branch and a main branch in git-hub. This was not intentional I realized that I have been pushing with master so everything went to master branch. However git-hub is now using main instead of master as first position. How can I move my master branch into main branch?
There are multipe ways to achieve this, but with pure git it can be done as follows:
#Change to the main branch
git checkout main
#Rebase the main branch on top of the current master. In easy words, go to the last point the two branches have in common, then add all the changes master did in the meanwhile and then add the changes done to main. If main is empty this is equivalent to
# git checkout master; git branch -D main; git checkout -b main
#which deletes the current main and then copies master over to main
git rebase master
# push back to GitHub (--force, because rabse does not add a commit, but changes the status, so push will be rejected without it)
git push --force
You can delete or rename a branch through the github web interface by visiting
https://github.com/YourName/YourRepo/branches
At time of writing you can access that page from the front page of your repository through the branches link:
And you can click the writing implement buttons to rename their associated branch:
It is worth noting that deleting and renaming branches through github is just as potentially destructive as doing it with CLI git or a GUI git client. You can of course re-push branches from your local clone, but you should make sure that clone is up to date before proceeding if you feel unsure.
Create a PR from master to main in the GitHub Webinterface.
If you want to do it local:
git checkout main
git merge master
git push
Set local master to track remote main:
git branch --set-upstream-to origin/main master
For first pull it will show error refusing to merge unrelated histories so you can pull with git pull origin main --allow-unrelated-histories
Push it into the main branch in GitHub.
How to submit a pull request from an existing locally-cloned repo?
Often, I want to look at some libraries source code from github, so I clone it. Later, I discover some issue with the code and raise it on a mailing list, often in passing. The library author says "nice find, can you send a pull request?".
And the answer is "not that easily". I haven't forked the repo yet, Ive cloned it. And there doesn't seem a way I can find to submit a pull request from a cloned repo?
If this limit is true, it feels like the sensible reaction is to fork anything and everything you ever look at, just so that if you ever might want to contribute, you can. And that fills up your github account with many inactive forks.
Doesn't seem a lot of talk about this issue - am I the only person whom this problem affects?
Fork the repo on GitHub, then add your fork repo as a remote to your local cloned copy:
git remote add myfork https://github.com/<myGitHubAccountName>/<repoName>.git
Then you can push to your fork:
git push myfork master
If you're doing more than just this one pull request, you can remove the origin remote and name your fork as origin:
git remote rm origin
git remote add origin https://github.com/<myGitHubAccountName>/<repoName>.git
This is typically what I do. Sometimes I add the original origin as upstream so I still have a reference to it.
If you're ok with installing another binary in your path, github has released a nice little tool called hub.
If you've cloned someone else's repo:
$ hub fork # This creates a fork and adds your repo as a remote
$ git push YOUR_USER feature # push the changes to your new remote
$ hub pull-request # will open your browser
I always clone instead of fork as well and the following steps work for me:
Create a new branch on your cloned repo and make the new change.
Push the change to your branch as the following:
git push origin insert_your_working_branch_name
Now you should be able to find your working branch in pull request from github master.
Is there a way to fork from a specific branch on GitHub? ā¦ For example, moodle has many branches (1.9, 2.0 ā¦ and so on). Can a clone be performed of just branch 1.9 and not the master branch always? Is it possible to clone a specific branch onto my PC?
I donāt know a native way yet, but you can do it following this recipe:
Fork the repository in question (called āupstreamā) on the GitHub website to your workspace there.
Run the GitHub desktop application and clone the repository onto your PC.
Use the GitHub desktop application to open a shell in the repository. (The git commands are not available from the default PowerShell unless you configure that manually.)
Set the source repository as upstream:
git remote add upstream https://github.com/{user}/{source-repo}.git
Fetch the full upstream repository. (Right now, you only have a copy of its master branch.)
git fetch upstream
Make your file system copy the branch you want and give it any name:
git checkout upstream/{branch-in-question}
git checkout -b temporary
Publish your repo using the GitHub desktop application.
On the GitHub website, open your repository and click āsettingsā.
Change the āDefault branchā to ātemporaryā. (Just change the drop-down menu, you donāt need to click the āRenameā button.)
Go back to your repository, go to the ābranchesā tab, now you can delete the āmasterā branch.
Delete the master branch on your shell and make a new master branch:
git branch -d master
git branch master
git checkout master
git -d temporary
Once more, publish your repo using the GitHub desktop application.
On the GitHub website, open your repository and click āsettingsā.
Change the āDefault branchā back to the (new) āmasterā branch.
Go back to your repository, go to the ābranchesā tab, now you can delete the ātemporaryā branch.
This should be what you were looking for. Perhaps GitHub will provide a more convenient way to do this in future (e.g., clicking āForkā from a projectās branch results in exactly this behaviour).
Cloning means that you create a copy of the whole repository in your account including all branches and tags. However you are free to switch and track branches however you like.
No command line needed. Just create a new branch in your forked repository in GitHub. GitHub will ask you if you want to clone/mirror this new branch from the upstream repository. You can give any name to the new branch.
Yes, you can clone the single branch. For example, you have a branch named release1.0. If you would like to clone this branch into your pc then use the following line of code:
$ git clone git#bitbucket.org:git_username/git_repository_example -b release1.0 --single-branch
For those who don't like working with command-line. Here is a simple guide using the desktop client for GitHub:
Click the fork button of the repo on GitHub.com:
Make sure you have the desktop client installed
Click this button:
Clone the repo
In the desktop client, select the desired branch
Select the branch you'd like to work on and you're done
I'm posting here the method I've used.
Like the OP I wanted to only copy/fork one branch. But couldn't find an easy way.
in your repo create a new branch. It doesn't need to have the same name as the branch you want to fork
once created, verify that it is the selected branch, and click "Compare"
reverse the order of comparison (I have a userscript for that, see my profile if it's something you want to test).
the "base" repository must be yours, with the branch you've created
the "head" repository is the original, and the branch is the branch you want to fork
hit "create pull request" and continue until the PR is applied
That's it. You have the branch forked.
I'm using bitbucket but I'm sure this would work for GitHub as well.
Create a new repository
Checkout the branch using GitExtensions
Click Push to open the Push dialog
Set the destination URL to the new repository
Set the destination branch to "master"
Push
Your new repository will have the full history of the one branch only (not all branches like forking will have).
A fast, alternative approach is to create your own new repo.
Go to https://github.com/new and make a new repo. Do not initialize with README.
Scroll down to get your git remote
Then:
git remote rm origin
git config master.remote origin
git config master.merge refs/heads/master
// Run code from above image
git push --set-upstream origin yourbranchname
You will have a new repo with the original repo's code and a branch that can be made into a pull request.
SOLUTION:
For remote repository on GitHub and local repository
After fork all branches to your GitHub repository, you can delete Redundant branches in your GitHub repository.
And then you can only clone the branches you need to local.
Step One
Step Two
Only For local repository
git clone -b <branch name> --single-branch <repository>
If you want to further save your disk space, you can clone remote repository without history:
git clone -b <branch name> --depth 1 <repository>
notice: --depth implies --single-branch unless --no-single-branch is given.
https://git-scm.com/docs/git-clone
Switch to the branch you need in source repo
Click "Fork". You'll get forked master and the branch you're in.
I don't know how it works with more branches, but for my needs worked pretty well.