How to git fetch and checkout without creating a remote branch locally?
git, git-checkout, git-fetch, merge, pull
Solution
You want to use `FETCH_HEAD`.
whenever you run `git fetch ...` a magic reference called `FETCH_HEAD` is created.
Try for example:
git fetch git://github.com/xxx/xxx.git branch_name && git merge FETCH_HEAD
Problem
Use Case: I have some repo on GitHub, someone forked it and added new feature and initiated pull request. I can't automatically merge it because there are some minor problems I would like to fix first. It's one-time activity I'll never need this remote repository, so I don't want to create local `remote` branch. Basically I would like to do: - copy files from remote repository and rewrite my own (without any git-related information). - see difference with my current head. - fix something and commit it. How to do that? `git checkout git://github.com/xxx/xxx.git` doesn't works at all (fail with error) `git fetch git://github.com/xxx/xxx.git` works but doesn't update anything