Wolfman and Dracula have been hired by Universal Missions (a space services spinoff from Euphoric State University) to investigate if it is possible to send their next planetary lander to Mars. They want to be able to work on the plans at the same time, but they have run into problems doing this in the past. If they take turns, each one will spend a lot of time waiting for the other to finish, but if they work on their own copies and email changes back and forth things will be lost, overwritten, or duplicated.
A colleague suggests using version control to manage their work. Version control is better than mailing files back and forth:
Nothing that is committed to version control is ever lost, unless you work really, really hard at it. Since all old versions of files are saved, it’s always possible to go back in time to see exactly who wrote what on a particular day, or what version of a program was used to generate a particular set of results.
As we have this record of who made what changes when, we know who to ask if we have questions later on, and, if needed, revert to a previous version, much like the “undo” feature in an editor.
When several people collaborate in the same project, it’s possible to accidentally overlook or overwrite someone’s changes. The version control system automatically notifies users whenever there’s a conflict between one person’s work and another’s.
Teams are not the only ones to benefit from version control: lone researchers can benefit immensely. Keeping a record of what was changed, when, and why is extremely useful for all researchers if they ever need to come back to the project later on (e.g., a year later, when memory has faded).
Version control is the lab notebook of the digital world: it’s what professionals use to keep track of what they’ve done and to collaborate with other people. Every large software development project relies on it, and most programmers use it for their small jobs as well. And it isn’t just for software: books, papers, small data sets, and anything that changes over time or needs to be shared can and should be stored in a version control system.
Prerequisites
In this lesson we use Git from the Unix Shell. Some previous experience with the shell is expected, but isn’t mandatory.
You will need an account at github.com for parts of the Git lesson. Basic GitHub accounts are free. We encourage you to create a GitHub account if you don't have one already. Please consider what personal information you'd like to reveal. For example, you may want to review these instructions for keeping your email address private provided at GitHub.
cmd and press [Enter])setx HOME "%USERPROFILE%"
SUCCESS: Specified value was saved.exit then pressing [Enter]This will provide you with both Git and Bash in the Git Bash program.
For OS X 10.9 and higher, install Git for Mac
by downloading and running the most recent "mavericks" installer from
this list.
After installing Git, there will not be anything in your /Applications folder,
as Git is a command line program.
For older versions of OS X (10.5-10.8) use the
most recent available installer labelled "snow-leopard"
available here.
If Git is not already available on your machine you can try to
install it via your distro's package manager. For Debian/Ubuntu run
sudo apt-get install git and for Fedora run
sudo yum install git.
nano is a basic editor and the default that instructors use in the workshop. To install it, download the Software Carpentry Windows installer and double click on the file to run it. This installer requires an active internet connection.
Others editors that you can use are Notepad++ or Sublime Text. Be aware that you must add its installation directory to your system path. Please ask your instructor to help you do this.
nano is a basic editor and the default that instructors use in the workshop. See the Git installation video tutorial for an example on how to open nano. It should be pre-installed.
Others editors that you can use are Text Wrangler or Sublime Text.
nano is a basic editor and the default that instructors use in the workshop. It should be pre-installed.
Others editors that you can use are Gedit, Kate or Sublime Text.
| 00:00 | Automated Version Control | What is version control and why should I use it? |
| 00:05 | Setting Up Git | How do I get set up to use Git? |
| 00:10 | Creating a Repository | Where does Git store information? |
| 00:20 | Tracking Changes |
How do I record changes in Git?
How do I check the status of my version control repository? How do I record notes about what changes I made and why? |
| 00:40 | Exploring History |
How can I identify old versions of files?
How do I review my changes? How can I recover old versions of files? |
| 01:05 | Ignoring Things | How can I tell Git to ignore files I don’t want to track? |
| 01:10 | Remotes in GitHub | How do I share my changes with others on the web? |
| 01:40 | Collaborating | How can I use version control to collaborate with other people? |
| 02:05 | Conflicts | What do I do when my changes conflict with someone else’s? |
| 02:20 | Open Science | How can version control help me make my work more open? |
| 02:30 | Licensing | What licensing information should I include with my work? |
| 02:35 | Citation | How can I make my work easier to cite? |
| 02:37 | Hosting | Where should I host my version control repositories? |
| 02:47 | Finish |