Question

let’s say I have the following config file

[branch "master"]
    remote = origin
    merge = refs/heads/master
[remote "origin"]
    url = ssh://origin.com
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
[remote "faraway"]
    url = ssh://faraway.com
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/faraway/*

if I do git checkout master; git pull origin then:

• fetch will run
• merge will merge the fetched branch with my current branch.

If I run git checkout master; git pull faraway, then will git-merge merge anything? After all, I am pulling from a different remote than the configured remote.

Answer 1

The remote = origin specifies the default behavior for pull (fetch actually) when you are in the branch. So when you do git pull , the remote is origin ( which is also the default i.e even if the remote was not specified, it would have pulled from origin. If some other remote was specified, that remote would have been fetched.)

And when you do git pull faraway, it will fetch the faraway branches but will not merge ( as faraway is not the configured remote) it in the current branch master, unless you do git pull faraway master