How to "git pull" from master into the development branch

branch, git, pull

Solution

The steps you listed will work, but there's a longer way that gives you more options:

git checkout dmgr2      # gets you "on branch dmgr2"
git fetch origin        # gets you up to date with origin
git merge origin/master

The `fetch` command can be done at any point before the `merge`, i.e., you can swap the order of the fetch and the checkout, because `fetch` just goes over to the named remote (`origin`) and says to it: "gimme everything you have that I don't", i.e., all commits on all branches. They get copied to your repository, but named `origin/branch` for any branch named `branch` on the remote.

At this point you can use any viewer (`git log`, `gitk`, etc) to see "what they have" that you don't, and vice versa. Sometimes this is only useful for Warm Fuzzy Feelings ("ah, yes, that is in fact what I want") and sometimes it is useful for changing strategies entirely ("whoa, I don't want THAT stuff yet").

Finally, the `merge` command takes the given commit, which you can name as `origin/master`, and does whatever it takes to bring in that commit and its ancestors, to whatever branch you are on when you run the `merge`. You can insert `--no-ff` or `--ff-only` to prevent a fast-forward, or merge only if the result is a fast-forward, if you like.

When you use the sequence:

git checkout dmgr2
git pull origin master

the `pull` command instructs git to run `git fetch`, and then the moral equivalent of `git merge origin/master`. So this is almost the same as doing the two steps by hand, but there are some subtle differences that probably are not too concerning to you. (In particular the `fetch` step run by `pull` brings over only `origin/master`, and it does not update the ref in your repo:1 any new commits winds up referred-to only by the special `FETCH_HEAD` reference.)

If you use the more-explicit `git fetch origin` (then optionally look around) and then `git merge origin/master` sequence, you can also bring your own local `master` up to date with the remote, with only one `fetch` run across the network:

git fetch origin
git checkout master
git merge --ff-only origin/master
git checkout dmgr2
git merge --no-ff origin/master

for instance.

1This second part has been changed—I say "fixed"—in git 1.8.4, which now updates "remote branch" references opportunistically. (It was, as the release notes say, a deliberate design decision to skip the update, but it turns out that more people prefer that git update it. If you want the old remote-branch SHA-1, it defaults to being saved in, and thus recoverable from, the reflog. This also enables a new git 1.9/2.0 feature for finding upstream rebases.)

Problem

Original source