Pulling peer's branch and getting tracking branch created

I can't seem to figure out the correct magic to get my buddy's branch, and create the appropriate tracking branch at the same time without doing a clone.

I don't want to branch from my master, just get his branch and the matching tracking branch...

It's been a long day, so sorry for the simplistic question, but how do I do this exactly?

Bill

Bill Lear <rael@zopyra.com> writes:

I'll cheat and ask "git show b6f5da1e" ;-).

	$ git remote add -f -m master bob ../bob.git/

which should add:

	[remote "bob"]
        	url = ../bob.git/
		fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/bob/*

to .git/config, and perform the initial "git fetch bob" so that bob's heads appear under your .git/refs/remotes/bob/*, iow, after this, you can ask:

	$ git branch -r
	  bob/HEAD
          bob/master
          bob/topic-1
          bob/topic-2
          ...

On Monday, February 26, 2007 at 16:59:27 (-0800) Junio C Hamano writes:

Ok, and then:

% git checkout -b topic-1 bob/topic-1

Gets me onto a topic branch ...

So, this does do what I've asked, and more: however, how can I get it to do only the one branch that I want and not all of the others? If this part is really annoyingly hard and/or stupid, don't hesitate to say so.

Bill

Bill Lear <rael@zopyra.com> writes:

This time, I'll cheat and ask you to ask "git show b6f5da1e" ;-).

On Monday, February 26, 2007 at 16:59:27 (-0800) Junio C Hamano writes:

Sorry, should have asked: what doe "-f -m master" mean? I looked in the man page, but didn't see anything on this.

Bill

Bill Lear <rael@zopyra.com> writes:

I should be the one who's saying sorry. I realized it was not documented and updated the doc last night. Here is an excerpt:

    'add'::

    Adds a remote named <name> for the repository at
    <url>.  The command `git fetch <name>` can then be used to create and
    update remote-tracking branches <name>/<branch>.

    With `-f` option, `git fetch <name>` is run immediately after
    the remote information is set up.

    With `-t <branch>` option, instead of the default glob
    refspec for the remote to track all branches under
    `$GIT_DIR/remotes/<name>/`, a refspec to track only `<branch>`
    is created.  You can give more than one `-t <branch>` to track
    multiple branche without grabbing all branches.

    With `-m <master>` option, `$GIT_DIR/remotes/<name>/HEAD` is set
    up to point at remote's `<master>` branch instead of whatever
    branch the `HEAD` at the remote repository actually points at.

But I realize that the commit log message of b6f5da should probably be massaged into the EXAMPLES section.

commit b6f5da1e0f4eeb59798b320f97d27f83d19f89df
Author: Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net>
Date:   Thu Feb 1 23:30:03 2007 -0800

    Teach git-remote add to fetch and track
    
    This adds three options to 'git-remote add'.
    
     * -f (or --fetch) option tells it to also run the initial "git
        fetch" using the newly created remote shorthand.
    
     * -t (or --track) option tells it not to use the default
        wildcard to track all branches.
    
     * -m (or --master) option tells it to make the
        remote/$name/HEAD point at a remote tracking branch other
        than master.
    
    For example, with this I can say:
    
      $ git remote add -f -t master -t quick-start -m master \
        jbf-um git://linux-nfs.org/~bfields/git.git/
    
    to
    
     (1) create remote.jbf-um.url;
    
     (2) track master and quick-start branches (and no other); the
         two -t options create these two lines:
    
           fetch = +refs/heads/master:refs/remotes/jbf-um/master
           fetch = +refs/heads/quick-start:refs/remotes/jbf-um/quick-start
    
     (3) set up remotes/jbf-um/HEAD to point at jbf-um/master so
         that later I can say "git log jbf-um"
    
    Or I could do
    
      $ git remote add -t 'ap/*' andy /home/andy/git.git
    
    to make Andy's topic branches kept track of under refs/remotes/andy/ap/.
    
    Other possible improvements I considered but haven't implemented
    (hint, hint) are:
    
     * reject wildcard letters other than a trailing '*' to the -t
       parameter;
    
     * make -m optional and when the first -t parameter does not
       have the trailing '*' default to that value (so the above
       example does not need to say "-m master");
    
     * if -m is not given, and -t parameter ends with '*' (i.e. the
       above defaulting did not tell us where to point HEAD at), and
       if we did the fetch with -f, check if 'master' was fetched
       and make HEAD point at it.
    
    Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <junkio@cox.net>

On Monday, February 26, 2007 at 17:13:27 (-0800) Junio C Hamano writes:

No problems.  As usual, superlative support here on the git list.

Thanks very much.

Bill