Re: git pull question

>> ...
>> $ git checkout master
>> $ git pull origin refs/heads/brA:brA
>>
>> The pull here seems to update both the current branch as well as brA?
>> Is this intentional?
>
> I believe this is intentional.
>
> A git pull always pulls into (at least) the currently checked out
> branch, in your case "master". By adding the <dst> param after the
> colon in the <refspec> you're saying to go ahead and fast-forward
> merge the local branch called "brA" if possible.

> However, I'm not entirely clear myself on the meaning of this note in
> the documentation:
>
> Note
> You never do your own development on branches that appear on the right
> hand side of a <refspec> colon on Pull: lines; they are to be updated
> by git fetch. If you intend to do development derived from a remote
> branch B, have a Pull: line to track it (i.e.  Pull: B:remote-B), and
> have a separate branch my-B to do your development on top of it. The
> latter is created by git branch my-B remote-B (or its equivalent git
> checkout -b my-B remote-B). Run git fetch to keep track of the
> progress of the remote side, and when you see something new on the
> remote branch, merge it into your development branch with git pull .
> remote-B, while you are on my-B branch.