1GIT-CHECKOUT(1)                   Git Manual                   GIT-CHECKOUT(1)
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NAME

6       git-checkout - Switch branches or restore working tree files
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SYNOPSIS

9       git checkout [-q] [-f] [-m] [<branch>]
10       git checkout [-q] [-f] [-m] --detach [<branch>]
11       git checkout [-q] [-f] [-m] [--detach] <commit>
12       git checkout [-q] [-f] [-m] [[-b|-B|--orphan] <new_branch>] [<start_point>]
13       git checkout [-f|--ours|--theirs|-m|--conflict=<style>] [<tree-ish>] [--] <paths>...
14       git checkout [<tree-ish>] [--] <pathspec>...
15       git checkout (-p|--patch) [<tree-ish>] [--] [<paths>...]
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17

DESCRIPTION

19       Updates files in the working tree to match the version in the index or
20       the specified tree. If no paths are given, git checkout will also
21       update HEAD to set the specified branch as the current branch.
22
23       git checkout <branch>
24           To prepare for working on <branch>, switch to it by updating the
25           index and the files in the working tree, and by pointing HEAD at
26           the branch. Local modifications to the files in the working tree
27           are kept, so that they can be committed to the <branch>.
28
29           If <branch> is not found but there does exist a tracking branch in
30           exactly one remote (call it <remote>) with a matching name, treat
31           as equivalent to
32
33               $ git checkout -b <branch> --track <remote>/<branch>
34
35           You could omit <branch>, in which case the command degenerates to
36           "check out the current branch", which is a glorified no-op with
37           rather expensive side-effects to show only the tracking
38           information, if exists, for the current branch.
39
40       git checkout -b|-B <new_branch> [<start point>]
41           Specifying -b causes a new branch to be created as if git-branch(1)
42           were called and then checked out. In this case you can use the
43           --track or --no-track options, which will be passed to git branch.
44           As a convenience, --track without -b implies branch creation; see
45           the description of --track below.
46
47           If -B is given, <new_branch> is created if it doesn’t exist;
48           otherwise, it is reset. This is the transactional equivalent of
49
50               $ git branch -f <branch> [<start point>]
51               $ git checkout <branch>
52
53           that is to say, the branch is not reset/created unless "git
54           checkout" is successful.
55
56       git checkout --detach [<branch>], git checkout [--detach] <commit>
57           Prepare to work on top of <commit>, by detaching HEAD at it (see
58           "DETACHED HEAD" section), and updating the index and the files in
59           the working tree. Local modifications to the files in the working
60           tree are kept, so that the resulting working tree will be the state
61           recorded in the commit plus the local modifications.
62
63           When the <commit> argument is a branch name, the --detach option
64           can be used to detach HEAD at the tip of the branch (git checkout
65           <branch> would check out that branch without detaching HEAD).
66
67           Omitting <branch> detaches HEAD at the tip of the current branch.
68
69       git checkout [<tree-ish>] [--] <pathspec>...
70           Overwrite paths in the working tree by replacing with the contents
71           in the index or in the <tree-ish> (most often a commit). When a
72           <tree-ish> is given, the paths that match the <pathspec> are
73           updated both in the index and in the working tree.
74
75           The index may contain unmerged entries because of a previous failed
76           merge. By default, if you try to check out such an entry from the
77           index, the checkout operation will fail and nothing will be checked
78           out. Using -f will ignore these unmerged entries. The contents from
79           a specific side of the merge can be checked out of the index by
80           using --ours or --theirs. With -m, changes made to the working tree
81           file can be discarded to re-create the original conflicted merge
82           result.
83
84       git checkout (-p|--patch) [<tree-ish>] [--] [<pathspec>...]
85           This is similar to the "check out paths to the working tree from
86           either the index or from a tree-ish" mode described above, but lets
87           you use the interactive interface to show the "diff" output and
88           choose which hunks to use in the result. See below for the
89           description of --patch option.
90

OPTIONS

92       -q, --quiet
93           Quiet, suppress feedback messages.
94
95       --[no-]progress
96           Progress status is reported on the standard error stream by default
97           when it is attached to a terminal, unless --quiet is specified.
98           This flag enables progress reporting even if not attached to a
99           terminal, regardless of --quiet.
100
101       -f, --force
102           When switching branches, proceed even if the index or the working
103           tree differs from HEAD. This is used to throw away local changes.
104
105           When checking out paths from the index, do not fail upon unmerged
106           entries; instead, unmerged entries are ignored.
107
108       --ours, --theirs
109           When checking out paths from the index, check out stage #2 (ours)
110           or #3 (theirs) for unmerged paths.
111
112           Note that during git rebase and git pull --rebase, ours and theirs
113           may appear swapped; --ours gives the version from the branch the
114           changes are rebased onto, while --theirs gives the version from the
115           branch that holds your work that is being rebased.
116
117           This is because rebase is used in a workflow that treats the
118           history at the remote as the shared canonical one, and treats the
119           work done on the branch you are rebasing as the third-party work to
120           be integrated, and you are temporarily assuming the role of the
121           keeper of the canonical history during the rebase. As the keeper of
122           the canonical history, you need to view the history from the remote
123           as ours (i.e. "our shared canonical history"), while what you did
124           on your side branch as theirs (i.e. "one contributor’s work on top
125           of it").
126
127       -b <new_branch>
128           Create a new branch named <new_branch> and start it at
129           <start_point>; see git-branch(1) for details.
130
131       -B <new_branch>
132           Creates the branch <new_branch> and start it at <start_point>; if
133           it already exists, then reset it to <start_point>. This is
134           equivalent to running "git branch" with "-f"; see git-branch(1) for
135           details.
136
137       -t, --track
138           When creating a new branch, set up "upstream" configuration. See
139           "--track" in git-branch(1) for details.
140
141           If no -b option is given, the name of the new branch will be
142           derived from the remote-tracking branch, by looking at the local
143           part of the refspec configured for the corresponding remote, and
144           then stripping the initial part up to the "*". This would tell us
145           to use "hack" as the local branch when branching off of
146           "origin/hack" (or "remotes/origin/hack", or even
147           "refs/remotes/origin/hack"). If the given name has no slash, or the
148           above guessing results in an empty name, the guessing is aborted.
149           You can explicitly give a name with -b in such a case.
150
151       --no-track
152           Do not set up "upstream" configuration, even if the
153           branch.autoSetupMerge configuration variable is true.
154
155       -l
156           Create the new branch’s reflog; see git-branch(1) for details.
157
158       --detach
159           Rather than checking out a branch to work on it, check out a commit
160           for inspection and discardable experiments. This is the default
161           behavior of "git checkout <commit>" when <commit> is not a branch
162           name. See the "DETACHED HEAD" section below for details.
163
164       --orphan <new_branch>
165           Create a new orphan branch, named <new_branch>, started from
166           <start_point> and switch to it. The first commit made on this new
167           branch will have no parents and it will be the root of a new
168           history totally disconnected from all the other branches and
169           commits.
170
171           The index and the working tree are adjusted as if you had
172           previously run "git checkout <start_point>". This allows you to
173           start a new history that records a set of paths similar to
174           <start_point> by easily running "git commit -a" to make the root
175           commit.
176
177           This can be useful when you want to publish the tree from a commit
178           without exposing its full history. You might want to do this to
179           publish an open source branch of a project whose current tree is
180           "clean", but whose full history contains proprietary or otherwise
181           encumbered bits of code.
182
183           If you want to start a disconnected history that records a set of
184           paths that is totally different from the one of <start_point>, then
185           you should clear the index and the working tree right after
186           creating the orphan branch by running "git rm -rf ." from the top
187           level of the working tree. Afterwards you will be ready to prepare
188           your new files, repopulating the working tree, by copying them from
189           elsewhere, extracting a tarball, etc.
190
191       --ignore-skip-worktree-bits
192           In sparse checkout mode, git checkout -- <paths> would update only
193           entries matched by <paths> and sparse patterns in
194           $GIT_DIR/info/sparse-checkout. This option ignores the sparse
195           patterns and adds back any files in <paths>.
196
197       -m, --merge
198           When switching branches, if you have local modifications to one or
199           more files that are different between the current branch and the
200           branch to which you are switching, the command refuses to switch
201           branches in order to preserve your modifications in context.
202           However, with this option, a three-way merge between the current
203           branch, your working tree contents, and the new branch is done, and
204           you will be on the new branch.
205
206           When a merge conflict happens, the index entries for conflicting
207           paths are left unmerged, and you need to resolve the conflicts and
208           mark the resolved paths with git add (or git rm if the merge should
209           result in deletion of the path).
210
211           When checking out paths from the index, this option lets you
212           recreate the conflicted merge in the specified paths.
213
214       --conflict=<style>
215           The same as --merge option above, but changes the way the
216           conflicting hunks are presented, overriding the merge.conflictStyle
217           configuration variable. Possible values are "merge" (default) and
218           "diff3" (in addition to what is shown by "merge" style, shows the
219           original contents).
220
221       -p, --patch
222           Interactively select hunks in the difference between the <tree-ish>
223           (or the index, if unspecified) and the working tree. The chosen
224           hunks are then applied in reverse to the working tree (and if a
225           <tree-ish> was specified, the index).
226
227           This means that you can use git checkout -p to selectively discard
228           edits from your current working tree. See the “Interactive Mode”
229           section of git-add(1) to learn how to operate the --patch mode.
230
231       --ignore-other-worktrees
232           git checkout refuses when the wanted ref is already checked out by
233           another worktree. This option makes it check the ref out anyway. In
234           other words, the ref can be held by more than one worktree.
235
236       --[no-]recurse-submodules
237           Using --recurse-submodules will update the content of all
238           initialized submodules according to the commit recorded in the
239           superproject. If local modifications in a submodule would be
240           overwritten the checkout will fail unless -f is used. If nothing
241           (or --no-recurse-submodules) is used, the work trees of submodules
242           will not be updated. Just like git-submodule(1), this will detach
243           the submodules HEAD.
244
245       <branch>
246           Branch to checkout; if it refers to a branch (i.e., a name that,
247           when prepended with "refs/heads/", is a valid ref), then that
248           branch is checked out. Otherwise, if it refers to a valid commit,
249           your HEAD becomes "detached" and you are no longer on any branch
250           (see below for details).
251
252           You can use the "@{-N}" syntax to refer to the N-th last
253           branch/commit checked out using "git checkout" operation. You may
254           also specify - which is synonymous to "@{-1}.
255
256           As a special case, you may use "A...B" as a shortcut for the merge
257           base of A and B if there is exactly one merge base. You can leave
258           out at most one of A and B, in which case it defaults to HEAD.
259
260       <new_branch>
261           Name for the new branch.
262
263       <start_point>
264           The name of a commit at which to start the new branch; see git-
265           branch(1) for details. Defaults to HEAD.
266
267       <tree-ish>
268           Tree to checkout from (when paths are given). If not specified, the
269           index will be used.
270

DETACHED HEAD

272       HEAD normally refers to a named branch (e.g. master). Meanwhile, each
273       branch refers to a specific commit. Let’s look at a repo with three
274       commits, one of them tagged, and with branch master checked out:
275
276                      HEAD (refers to branch 'master')
277                       |
278                       v
279           a---b---c  branch 'master' (refers to commit 'c')
280               ^
281               |
282             tag 'v2.0' (refers to commit 'b')
283
284
285       When a commit is created in this state, the branch is updated to refer
286       to the new commit. Specifically, git commit creates a new commit d,
287       whose parent is commit c, and then updates branch master to refer to
288       new commit d. HEAD still refers to branch master and so indirectly now
289       refers to commit d:
290
291           $ edit; git add; git commit
292
293                          HEAD (refers to branch 'master')
294                           |
295                           v
296           a---b---c---d  branch 'master' (refers to commit 'd')
297               ^
298               |
299             tag 'v2.0' (refers to commit 'b')
300
301
302       It is sometimes useful to be able to checkout a commit that is not at
303       the tip of any named branch, or even to create a new commit that is not
304       referenced by a named branch. Let’s look at what happens when we
305       checkout commit b (here we show two ways this may be done):
306
307           $ git checkout v2.0  # or
308           $ git checkout master^^
309
310              HEAD (refers to commit 'b')
311               |
312               v
313           a---b---c---d  branch 'master' (refers to commit 'd')
314               ^
315               |
316             tag 'v2.0' (refers to commit 'b')
317
318
319       Notice that regardless of which checkout command we use, HEAD now
320       refers directly to commit b. This is known as being in detached HEAD
321       state. It means simply that HEAD refers to a specific commit, as
322       opposed to referring to a named branch. Let’s see what happens when we
323       create a commit:
324
325           $ edit; git add; git commit
326
327                HEAD (refers to commit 'e')
328                 |
329                 v
330                 e
331                /
332           a---b---c---d  branch 'master' (refers to commit 'd')
333               ^
334               |
335             tag 'v2.0' (refers to commit 'b')
336
337
338       There is now a new commit e, but it is referenced only by HEAD. We can
339       of course add yet another commit in this state:
340
341           $ edit; git add; git commit
342
343                    HEAD (refers to commit 'f')
344                     |
345                     v
346                 e---f
347                /
348           a---b---c---d  branch 'master' (refers to commit 'd')
349               ^
350               |
351             tag 'v2.0' (refers to commit 'b')
352
353
354       In fact, we can perform all the normal Git operations. But, let’s look
355       at what happens when we then checkout master:
356
357           $ git checkout master
358
359                          HEAD (refers to branch 'master')
360                 e---f     |
361                /          v
362           a---b---c---d  branch 'master' (refers to commit 'd')
363               ^
364               |
365             tag 'v2.0' (refers to commit 'b')
366
367
368       It is important to realize that at this point nothing refers to commit
369       f. Eventually commit f (and by extension commit e) will be deleted by
370       the routine Git garbage collection process, unless we create a
371       reference before that happens. If we have not yet moved away from
372       commit f, any of these will create a reference to it:
373
374           $ git checkout -b foo   (1)
375           $ git branch foo        (2)
376           $ git tag foo           (3)
377
378
379       1. creates a new branch foo, which refers to commit f, and then updates
380       HEAD to refer to branch foo. In other words, we’ll no longer be in
381       detached HEAD state after this command.
382       2. similarly creates a new branch foo, which refers to commit f, but
383       leaves HEAD detached.
384       3. creates a new tag foo, which refers to commit f, leaving HEAD
385       detached.
386
387       If we have moved away from commit f, then we must first recover its
388       object name (typically by using git reflog), and then we can create a
389       reference to it. For example, to see the last two commits to which HEAD
390       referred, we can use either of these commands:
391
392           $ git reflog -2 HEAD # or
393           $ git log -g -2 HEAD
394
395

ARGUMENT DISAMBIGUATION

397       When there is only one argument given and it is not -- (e.g. "git
398       checkout abc"), and when the argument is both a valid <tree-ish> (e.g.
399       a branch "abc" exists) and a valid <pathspec> (e.g. a file or a
400       directory whose name is "abc" exists), Git would usually ask you to
401       disambiguate. Because checking out a branch is so common an operation,
402       however, "git checkout abc" takes "abc" as a <tree-ish> in such a
403       situation. Use git checkout -- <pathspec> if you want to checkout these
404       paths out of the index.
405

EXAMPLES

407        1. The following sequence checks out the master branch, reverts the
408           Makefile to two revisions back, deletes hello.c by mistake, and
409           gets it back from the index.
410
411               $ git checkout master             (1)
412               $ git checkout master~2 Makefile  (2)
413               $ rm -f hello.c
414               $ git checkout hello.c            (3)
415
416           1. switch branch
417           2. take a file out of another commit
418           3. restore hello.c from the index
419
420           If you want to check out all C source files out of the index, you
421           can say
422
423               $ git checkout -- '*.c'
424
425           Note the quotes around *.c. The file hello.c will also be checked
426           out, even though it is no longer in the working tree, because the
427           file globbing is used to match entries in the index (not in the
428           working tree by the shell).
429
430           If you have an unfortunate branch that is named hello.c, this step
431           would be confused as an instruction to switch to that branch. You
432           should instead write:
433
434               $ git checkout -- hello.c
435
436
437        2. After working in the wrong branch, switching to the correct branch
438           would be done using:
439
440               $ git checkout mytopic
441
442           However, your "wrong" branch and correct "mytopic" branch may
443           differ in files that you have modified locally, in which case the
444           above checkout would fail like this:
445
446               $ git checkout mytopic
447               error: You have local changes to 'frotz'; not switching branches.
448
449           You can give the -m flag to the command, which would try a
450           three-way merge:
451
452               $ git checkout -m mytopic
453               Auto-merging frotz
454
455           After this three-way merge, the local modifications are not
456           registered in your index file, so git diff would show you what
457           changes you made since the tip of the new branch.
458
459        3. When a merge conflict happens during switching branches with the -m
460           option, you would see something like this:
461
462               $ git checkout -m mytopic
463               Auto-merging frotz
464               ERROR: Merge conflict in frotz
465               fatal: merge program failed
466
467           At this point, git diff shows the changes cleanly merged as in the
468           previous example, as well as the changes in the conflicted files.
469           Edit and resolve the conflict and mark it resolved with git add as
470           usual:
471
472               $ edit frotz
473               $ git add frotz
474
475

GIT

477       Part of the git(1) suite
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481Git 2.18.1                        05/14/2019                   GIT-CHECKOUT(1)
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