Question

I often face this problem with git:
I clone a git repo of some project. Then I make changes to some source file, but I don’t commit it, because my work is not complete. But I have to keep updating my repo to make it in sync with the master. So I do a ‘git pull’, so that my repository is up-to-date and so I can produce my patch against the latest repo.
Now suppose I edit the file hello.c in my local clone (not yet committed) and someone else has made changes to the same file and committed it to the master repo. Now when I do ‘git pull’ the other person’s changes get added to hello.c and the changes that I had made, get deleted. This is the natural behavior obviously.
Is there a way to tell git to only ‘add’ changes and not ‘subtract’ anything? Or something to that effect? I don’t want my changes to be deleted when I do a git pull, but also I want to work with the latest repository.

Answer 1

• As Greg said – “Commit!”. “Commit often, commit fast” is common rule in VCS-world for years
• Use correct commands for your tasks. If you don’t know all behind the scene of git pull – read FM! Learn difference between pull and fetch or see at examples in Git Reference

The second command that will fetch down new data from a remote server
is git pull. This command will basically run a git fetch immediately
followed by a git merge of the branch on that remote that is tracked
by whatever branch you are currently in. I personally don’t much like
this command – I prefer running fetch and merge seperately. Less
magic, less problems.

• Use good, bullet-proof workflow. Quote from online git-pull(1) Manual Page

You never do your own development on branches that appear on the right
hand side of a 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.